How many sets should you do per exercise?

Two to three. A meta-analysis of sets per exercise found multiple sets clearly beat one set, and found no significant difference between 2 to 3 sets and 4 to 6. So the third set is worth doing and the fifth is not reliably buying you anything on that exercise.

Is 3 sets of 8 enough?

Yes, for that exercise. Three sets sits in the range that outperformed one set and matched anything higher. Is it enough overall? That depends on how many other sets that muscle gets across your week, which is the number the research actually measures.

Is 5 sets too much for one exercise?

Not harmful, but probably not paying for itself. The comparison between 2 to 3 sets and 4 to 6 sets per exercise came out even, so sets 4 and 5 are extra work with no measured extra return. Spreading them across a second exercise for the same muscle is the better use of the time.

How many sets per muscle per week should you do?

More is generally better with diminishing returns, and the honest answer is a slope rather than a target. Each additional weekly set was worth about 0.37% more growth. The widely quoted "at least 10 sets a week" is a trend in its source paper that did not reach statistical significance, so treat it as a reasonable aim and not as a proven threshold.

Does a set of rows count towards your biceps?

Partly, and there is now a number on it. The largest analysis of training volume tested counting indirect sets as a full set, as half a set, or as nothing, and half fitted the evidence best. So a row is a full back set and about half a biceps set.

Is 20 sets in a workout too much?

Twenty sets across a session spread over several muscles is ordinary. Twenty hard sets for one muscle in one session is well past what the evidence supports. The research measures a week rather than a day, so spreading them out is the change worth making.

Do more sets build strength as fast as they build size?

No. The most recent analysis found volume raises both, but the returns flatten considerably sooner for strength than for size. If you are chasing strength rather than size, adding sets stops paying earlier.

Back to the library

How many sets per exercise

Two to three. Four to six is not reliably better than two to three.

Last updated 22 August 2026

That is the answer to the question as asked, and it comes from the one analysis that measured sets the way you just counted them. The rest of this page is why that number matters less than a second one, and how to work out your own.

The short version

The question	The answer
Sets per exercise	2 to 3. More is not reliably better.
Is 1 set enough	It works, and it is measurably worse than 3.
Sets per muscle per week	More helps, with diminishing returns. No proven threshold.
What a set of rows counts as	One back set, and about half a biceps set.

The answer to the question you asked

In 2010 Krieger pooled 8 studies into 55 measurements and compared sets per exercise directly. Doing more than one set beat doing one. The ladder ran 0.24 for a single set, 0.34 for 2 to 3, and 0.44 for 4 to 6.

Then the part that gets left out. The gap between 2 to 3 sets and 4 to 6 sets was not statistically significant. Going from one set to three is a real improvement you can measure. Going from three to six, on that exercise, is not.

So the practical answer is 3, and the fourth and fifth set are not where your next bit of progress is hiding.

Why that is the less useful number

Almost every page answering this question answers it per exercise, per session. The research that studies how much training you need does not. It counts sets per muscle, per week.

That is not pedantry, because the two come apart immediately. Three sets of bench press is three chest sets if you train chest once a week and nine if you train it three times. The per-exercise number cannot tell you which, and the weekly number is the one that tracks growth.

Schoenfeld, Ogborn and Krieger pooled 34 groups from 15 studies in 2017. The relationship turned out to be a slope rather than a target. Each extra weekly set was worth about 0.37% more growth, and the higher-volume arm of a study beat the lower one by about 3.9%.

The number everyone repeats, and what it actually says

You have probably read that you need at least 10 sets per muscle per week. That comes from the paper above, which split its data three ways: under 5 weekly sets, 5 to 9, and 10 or more.

That split reached P = 0.074. In plain terms, the authors reported it as a trend and it did not reach the usual bar for calling a result real. Their own summary of it is that the evidence "showed a trend".

Ten sets a week is a reasonable aim, and the slope above supports doing more rather than less. It is not the proven threshold it gets quoted as, and a page telling you that you need 10 is telling you more than the paper does.

A set is not always one set

The largest analysis of this question is the newest. In 2026 Pelland and colleagues pooled 67 studies and 2,058 people, and before analysing anything they had to decide a question nobody had settled: when you row, how much of that counts as biceps work?

They tested three answers. Count an indirect set as a full set, as half a set, or as nothing at all. Half fitted the evidence best, and their conclusion is that telling direct sets from indirect ones "appears essential" for predicting what training will do.

This is the part this site can actually help with, and it is not a coincidence. Every one of the 158 exercise pages here already separates the muscle the lift is for from the muscles that only steady you, because that is what the site is for. Take the bent-over row: a full back set, about half a biceps set. So your weekly count for a muscle is the direct sets plus half of the indirect ones, and you can read which is which off the page for every lift you do.

If you want strength rather than size

The same 2026 analysis found volume raises both, and that the two do not behave the same way. Both flatten off as volume climbs, and the flattening is considerably sharper for strength.

Frequency splits them further. Training a muscle more often clearly helped strength. For size, the effect was, in the paper's own words, compatible with negligible.

So if strength is the goal, adding sets stops paying sooner, and spreading what you do across more sessions matters more.

One page on these results disagrees with all of this

When this page was written in August 2026, a 1998 review by Carpinelli and Otto sat seventh in the results for this question. It argues there is no significant difference between one set and several, and that there is "little scientific evidence, and no theoretical physiological basis" for more volume producing more.

It is worth knowing why we are not following it. It is 28 years old and it predates every analysis on this page. Krieger pooled the hypertrophy data it could not and found a difference. That is how it should work, and the older paper is not junk for having been superseded.

What to actually do

3 sets on an exercise. Not 1, and there is no measured reason for 5.
Count by muscle, by week, not by exercise.
Count a direct set as one and an indirect set as a half.
If you want more volume, add a second exercise rather than more sets of the first.
Chasing strength, add sessions before you add sets.

The counting is the hard part, and it is the part the workout builder does for you: it records the sets you actually banked rather than the ones you planned. The other half of the session question is how long to wait between those sets, which is how long to rest between sets. For what to expect once the counting is right, see how long it takes to build muscle.

Common questions

How many sets should you do per exercise?: Two to three. A meta-analysis of sets per exercise found multiple sets clearly beat one set, and found no significant difference between 2 to 3 sets and 4 to 6. So the third set is worth doing and the fifth is not reliably buying you anything on that exercise.
Is 3 sets of 8 enough?: Yes, for that exercise. Three sets sits in the range that outperformed one set and matched anything higher. Is it enough overall? That depends on how many other sets that muscle gets across your week, which is the number the research actually measures.
Is 5 sets too much for one exercise?: Not harmful, but probably not paying for itself. The comparison between 2 to 3 sets and 4 to 6 sets per exercise came out even, so sets 4 and 5 are extra work with no measured extra return. Spreading them across a second exercise for the same muscle is the better use of the time.
How many sets per muscle per week should you do?: More is generally better with diminishing returns, and the honest answer is a slope rather than a target. Each additional weekly set was worth about 0.37% more growth. The widely quoted "at least 10 sets a week" is a trend in its source paper that did not reach statistical significance, so treat it as a reasonable aim and not as a proven threshold.
Does a set of rows count towards your biceps?: Partly, and there is now a number on it. The largest analysis of training volume tested counting indirect sets as a full set, as half a set, or as nothing, and half fitted the evidence best. So a row is a full back set and about half a biceps set.
Is 20 sets in a workout too much?: Twenty sets across a session spread over several muscles is ordinary. Twenty hard sets for one muscle in one session is well past what the evidence supports. The research measures a week rather than a day, so spreading them out is the change worth making.
Do more sets build strength as fast as they build size?: No. The most recent analysis found volume raises both, but the returns flatten considerably sooner for strength than for size. If you are chasing strength rather than size, adding sets stops paying earlier.

Where these numbers come from

Every figure on this page comes from one of 4 papers. We store the fetched record for each one, so the author list and the population you are reading are the ones the paper actually has.

Krieger JW, 2010. Single vs. multiple sets of resistance exercise for muscle hypertrophy: a meta-analysis. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 24(4):1150 to 1159. 55 measurements from 8 studies. The source of the per-exercise answer.
Schoenfeld BJ, Ogborn D, Krieger JW, 2017. Dose-response relationship between weekly resistance training volume and increases in muscle mass. Journal of Sports Sciences 35(11):1073 to 1082. 34 groups from 15 studies. The source of the weekly slope, and of the 10 sets figure.
Pelland JC, Remmert JF, Robinson ZP, Hinson SR, Zourdos MC, 2026. The Resistance Training Dose Response. Sports Medicine 56:481 to 505. 67 studies, 2,058 people, 79% male, average age 25. The source of the half-set counting and the strength comparison.
Carpinelli RN, Otto RM, 1998. Strength training. Single versus multiple sets. Sports Medicine 26(2):73 to 84. The dissent, included because it ranks for this question.

What this page does not claim: a sets-by-experience table, an upper limit where volume stops working, anything about overtraining, or any rep and load prescription. The experience tables you will see elsewhere are coaching models rather than measurements, and none of these four papers produced one. All four are pooled averages across studies rather than a prescription for one person, and the people in them were overwhelmingly young men.

If a lift hurts rather than being hard, stop and see a physiotherapist.