With so many arm exercises out there, it’s hard to know what arm workout to do. But you’re probably doing too many bicep exercises and tricep exercises and focusing on the wrong areas. In fact, after cutting out all the fluff and focusing on just 2 science-backed arm exercises, I’ve gotten fuller and bigger arms. I also asked the top natural bodybuilders and muscle growth researchers (Alberto Nunez, Mike Israetel from RP Strength, Daniel Plotkin) the same question. “If you could only pick 2 exercises — 1 best exercise for bicep and 1 tricep exercise — to maximize growth, what would they be?” And they all pointed to the same 2 weird exercises. Today, I’ll show you what these 2 best arm exercises are and teach you how to do them properly in your arms workout at the gym so your arms grow faster than ever.
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Timestamps:
0:00 – 0:30 : Why Less Is More
0:30 – 1:16 : Downsides of Regular Curls
1:16 – 2:59 : New Biceps Research
3:00 – 4:28 – Reverse Preacher Curls
4:29 – 5:21- Lying Dumbbell Curls
5:22 – 6:10 – Lying Dumbbell Curls (Supported)
6:11 – 6:39 – Behind Body Cable Curls
6:40 – 8:01 – Triceps Research
8:02 – 8:55 – Overhead Extensions
8:56 – 10:20 – Form Tips For Joint Health
10:30 – How to Implement The Exercises
Out of the many bicep arm exercises, I started in the gym with standard bicep curls. But here’s the problem. They challenge your biceps mostly in the middle position when your arm is flexed. This is a similar challenge your biceps already get from your back exercises. Plus, because the biceps cross all the way over the shoulder, exercises like dumbbell curls don’t stretch your biceps as much as they could by exercises where your arm stays behind you. Which, at least based on research on other muscle groups, seems to be a powerful way to stimulate more growth.
To discover the best exercise for your biceps, scientists from a brand new 2025 study ran an exercise comparison. They split participants into 2 groups. One group did only incline curls for 8 weeks, whereas the other group did preacher curls. Incline curls led to more growth in the upper part of the arm, but preacher curls led to more growth in the lower part of the arm! Meaning? Theoretically, to maximize growth in all parts of your biceps, you’d want an exercise where the challenge is hardest at the bottom but without the arm held in front of the body, so the biceps are more stretched. Fitness experts share 3 options when it comes to the best exercise for biceps: reverse preacher curls, flat bench dumbbell curls, and behind-the-body cable bicep curls.
But even with the best arm exercises for the bicep, your biceps only contribute about a third of your arm size. The other two-thirds? The triceps. Unfortunately, most people use arm exercises — like pushdowns, close-grip presses, or dips — that don’t allow this muscle to reach its full potential. Those arm exercises primarily work just 2 parts of the triceps: the lateral head and the medial head. Which are what beef up the triceps from the front and side.But the third head, the long head, is the biggest part of the triceps and beefs them up from the back and hangs down when you flex your arms. So, what’s the better option?
To find out which tricep exercise would yield bigger arms, Scientists from a 2022 study had subjects perform overhead extensions with one arm and pushdowns with the other arm for 12 weeks. Now, because the long head crosses over the shoulder, whenever you do a triceps exercise with your arm overhead, this muscle gets stretched, which, as you know by now, seems to boost growth in certain muscles. But surprisingly, all 3 heads grew more with the overhead extensions, resulting in 1.4x more overall triceps growth than the pushdowns. Now, we don’t yet know why the other 2 heads grew more, and we could definitely use another study to confirm these findings, but the researchers used MRI, which is the gold standard of measurement, so the study is strong. This is also why every single expert I spoke to chose the overhead extension as their #1 triceps exercise.
Alberto prefers the overhead tricep extension with a rope. Daniel likes the overhead tricep extension with a cable, usually with his hand wrapped through the D handle and elbow propped up. Which variation should you choose? What you’re looking for is a variation where you feel very little to no pain in your elbows or shoulders as you do it, yet feel a great pump in your triceps after you finish your set.
As for how to implement these arm exercises in your arms workout in the gym, while other arm exercises are still great and can help grow your arms, for the best results, you’ll wanna do these 2 specific movements for 3 sets of 10-15 reps at least 1-2 times per week.
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Let me know how you like the exercises! If you want me to take care of your workout AND nutrition programming for you using the latest science, try out BWS+, the smartest fitness app out there. You can get 2 weeks free over at builtwithscience.com , no strings attached.
Any thoughts on hammer curls??
I love when small people with muscle imbalance tell people how to get massive arms, LMFAO..
want massive arms? Workout and eat a calorie surplus. There, thats the foundation on how u build muscle and get bigger arms, chest, legs, ect. I saved u 11 mins!
@ 9:30 one important note about the overhead tricep extension: when you flare out your elbows behind your head, that puts the delt in a fully contracted position and it becomes more of a shoulder exercise.
To target the triceps, you must find a way to to keep your elbows in front of your head, whether it's with a bar or rope.
Dips with body weight or weight added and lean more back as your arm straightens all the way. When you are fully straight up and elbows are locked, lean back only as far as you’re able to and hold that position with your arms still straight. This is a gymnast workout.
This is what I used to do until I had my hands hurt by an accident. It was the best thing for triceps
Why don’t you make a video where you can rant for 2 hours? And one for just exercises
4:39 Lying dumbbell curls
Biceps and triceps for bigger arms? Who knew!
Hey Jeremy,
I was wondering if you have any tips for the overhead tricep extensions for those of us with limited shoulder mobility? I can’t feel the exercise in my tricep due to low mobility from previous injuries. Thanks for the content! You’re a legend
I know why you see so many people doing clown excersises at gym is because they watch garbage like this.
Natural bodybuilder? Stfu! Not a single person in this video is natural and These exercises are dumb af. Just do the cable curls or standing curls. Don't lay back on a preacher curl and do curls you're going to hyper extend your elbow and there's no tension at the top.
What if you have issues like injuries that prevent you from doing overhead exercises like this? Then what tricep exercises best?
Alright everyone, now that you have the information you just need to find a gym empty enough were you can do hipthrust curlls without feeling too judged
Tried the bicep ones yesterday and they lit my bi's up!
Очень интересно слушать
Интересно, все понятно, давай еще
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Question here is starting out, which is the best?
Shoulder is stressed too much in your positions
Spare us the all-natural claims..
seeing the red zones of what muscle groups are being worked out helps a lot for visual learners like myself. much appreciated.