How high should you raise a plate front raise?

To shoulder height. The plate is hardest to hold when your arms are horizontal, because that is where gravity has the most leverage on your shoulder, and it gets easier the further past that you go. Raising it over your head looks like more work and is less.

Is a plate front raise better than dumbbells?

It is different rather than better, and nobody has measured them against each other. The plate ties your arms together so a stronger side cannot take over, which is its real advantage. Dumbbells give you finer weight jumps and do not depend on your grip lasting the set.

Front raises or lateral raises for bigger shoulders?

Lateral raises, if it has to be one. They load the middle head, which is what gives a shoulder width, and they load it because taking your arm out to the side is the action that head performs, while raising it in front is the front head doing its own job. Front raises hit the head your pressing already covers.

How heavy should a plate front raise be?

Lighter than people expect, because your arms are almost straight and the plate is a long way from your shoulder. A 10 lb / 4.5 kg or 25 lb / 11 kg plate is a serious front raise for most people. If you need to swing it up, it is the wrong plate.

Why do my traps take over on front raises?

Usually because the plate is going above shoulder height, or the shoulders are shrugging up to meet it. Stop the raise level with your shoulders and keep them pulled down away from your ears. Your traps still work, rotating the shoulder blade, but they should not be lifting the plate.

Back to the library

Plate · beginner · shoulders

Plate front raise

Also called Plate raise, Weight plate front raise, Two-hand front raise, Front plate raise.

The short answer

The plate front raise grips a weight plate by its edges, hands level with each other at the sides, and lifts it forward to shoulder height with your arms nearly straight. The front of your shoulder is the muscle raising it. The upper strip of your chest, the part attached to your collarbone, helps at the front, and your traps rotate your shoulder blades so the arms have somewhere to swing from. Two hands on one plate means neither arm can quietly do more than the other, which is the main thing this version has over dumbbells.

How to do it

Step oneStand upright and hold a weight plate with both hands at the 3 and 9 o'clock positions in front of your thighs.
Step twoKeep a slight bend in your elbows and your core engaged.
Step threeRaise the plate forward and upward in a controlled arc until your arms are parallel to the floor.
Step fourPause briefly at the top, then slowly lower the plate back to the starting position.

What usually goes wrong

Each starts with what you would notice.

The plate gets a little kick from your hips at the start of each rep.

WhyThe first few inches are the part your shoulder has to start cold, so the body finds a way around them. Once the plate is moving it will coast to shoulder height on its own.

FixStart each rep from a dead stop with the plate resting against your thighs, and take a full second to get it out of there. If it will not move without the kick, that is the plate telling you which one to pick up instead.

You end up leaning backward by the top of the set.

WhyA plate held out at full reach in front pulls you forward, and leaning back is the cheapest way to balance it. It also quietly turns the raise into a half-rep, because your torso moved instead of your arms.

FixSet your ribs down and squeeze your glutes before the first rep, and stand with the plate raising in front of a body that stays still. Standing with your back against a wall for one set will show you immediately how much of this you are doing.

You raise the plate up past your face because it feels like more work.

WhyIt is less. Gravity pulls the plate straight down, so the leverage against your shoulder is at its greatest when your arms are horizontal, and it drops away as they climb past that.

FixStop when your arms are level with your shoulders and hold there for a beat. The extra inches above that are the easiest part of the range, and they are where the traps start taking over.

Your elbows are bending more by the end of a set than at the start.

WhyA bent elbow brings the plate closer to your shoulder, which shortens the lever and makes the same plate easier to raise. The set gets lighter without anybody changing the weight.

FixKeep the same slight bend from the first rep to the last, and stop the set when it starts to change rather than grinding out reps at a shorter lever.

Plate or dumbbells

Nobody has measured the two against each other, so anyone telling you one activates the shoulder more is guessing. What is different is practical and it is worth knowing.

Both hands on one plate bind your arms together. If your right shoulder is stronger it cannot quietly take more of the plate, because the plate is rigid and both hands are on it. With two dumbbells that is exactly what happens and it is hard to see from the inside.

The costs are grip and granularity. You are holding a smooth disc by its edges the whole set, so a sweaty hand ends the set before the shoulder does, and the jumps between plates are big. Going from 25 lb / 11 kg to 45 lb / 20 kg is nearly double, where dumbbells would give you the steps in between.

Front raise or lateral raise

They train different heads of the same muscle and they are not interchangeable. Raising in front loads the front head, because carrying your arm forward and up is the action that head is built for. Raising out to the side loads the middle head, because taking your arm away from your body sideways is what that one does. The two heads pull your arm in different directions, so the direction you raise in is what decides which of them is working.

When people say they want wider shoulders, the middle head is what they are describing, so the lateral raise is the one that answers that. The front raise answers a narrower question, which is the front of the shoulder specifically.

If you can only pick one, pick the lateral raise, for the reason in the next section.

What it will not do

The front raise is the most redundant of the three raises, and that is the useful thing to know before you spend sets on it.

The front of your shoulder is already the head that every press works hardest. It flexes the shoulder, which is what carries your arm forward and up, so it is loaded on every bench press and every overhead press you do, whether or not you were thinking about it. If you bench and you press overhead, the front of your shoulder has had a heavy day already.

That does not make front raises pointless. It makes them a small addition rather than a headline exercise, and it means the honest place for them is after the pressing, light, for the range a press does not cover. If your training time is short, the lateral raise and the rear delt work are the ones with something new to add.

It will also not fix how your shoulders sit. Standing up straighter during a set of raises is doing the exercise properly, and it is a separate matter from how you carry yourself the rest of the day.

What it is for

The weighted plate front raise is a shoulder exercise targeting the anterior deltoid. Holding a plate requires grip strength and keeps both hands working together, providing a different stimulus to the front delt compared to dumbbell variations.

Questions people ask

What muscles does the plate front raise work?: The front head of your shoulder raises the plate. The upper part of your chest, the strip running from your collarbone, helps at the front, and your traps rotate your shoulder blades to give the arms a stable base. Only the collarbone portion of the chest is involved, not the whole muscle.
How high should you raise a plate front raise?: To shoulder height. The plate is hardest to hold when your arms are horizontal, because that is where gravity has the most leverage on your shoulder, and it gets easier the further past that you go. Raising it over your head looks like more work and is less.
Is a plate front raise better than dumbbells?: It is different rather than better, and nobody has measured them against each other. The plate ties your arms together so a stronger side cannot take over, which is its real advantage. Dumbbells give you finer weight jumps and do not depend on your grip lasting the set.
Front raises or lateral raises for bigger shoulders?: Lateral raises, if it has to be one. They load the middle head, which is what gives a shoulder width, and they load it because taking your arm out to the side is the action that head performs, while raising it in front is the front head doing its own job. Front raises hit the head your pressing already covers.
How heavy should a plate front raise be?: Lighter than people expect, because your arms are almost straight and the plate is a long way from your shoulder. A 10 lb / 4.5 kg or 25 lb / 11 kg plate is a serious front raise for most people. If you need to swing it up, it is the wrong plate.
Why do my traps take over on front raises?: Usually because the plate is going above shoulder height, or the shoulders are shrugging up to meet it. Stop the raise level with your shoulders and keep them pulled down away from your ears. Your traps still work, rotating the shoulder blade, but they should not be lifting the plate.