The Best 6

6-day workout splits can be remarkably good for building muscle. With so many training days to play with, you can take several different approaches, ranging from minimalism to total maximalism. You’re training often enough that you can build muscle with short 20-minute workouts. On the other hand, you could use the extra training days as an opportunity to add more volume to your routine.

However, when you’re training this often, it’s easy to wear yourself out. You’re stressing your hands, postural muscles, and joints almost every day of the week. You need to be smart about it. Fortunately, there’s a long tradition of training 6 days per week. All the lumps have been hammered flat.

The two most popular 6-day workout splits are the push/pull/legs split and the upper/lower split. Both can be great for building muscle, but one makes for a better default, especially when done right.

6-day workout splits are workout routines that have you doing 6 different workouts per week. The most common is the push/pull/legs split, where each day focuses on a different area of the body, like so:

The idea is that a vigorous workout can stimulate 2–3 days of growth. If you train a muscle every day, you won’t fully recover, and your performance will suffer. If you wait longer than 3–4 days, you’ll miss out on an opportunity to stimulate a new wave of growth.

You can train your muscles more often if you train them more gently. This is called high-frequency training. You can find 6-day splits that train every muscle every workout. I don’t recommend it. It doesn’t stimulate extra muscle growth, and it’s hard to avoid overuse injuries.

Another popular variation is the 6-day upper/lower split, where you alternate between training your upper and lower body, like so:

I’m a fan of Upper/Lower Workout Splits, but the 6-day version is a bit much, especially for your back and postural muscles. In our experience, the Push/Pull/Legs Split stimulates just as much muscle growth while doing a better job of managing recovery.