Band-Assisted Muscle Up
A muscle up with a band looped over the bar for support: you pull explosively, lean your chest over the bar and press up to straight arms, working your lats and chest.
- Primary muscles
- Lower chest, Lats
- Secondary
- Front delts, Upper back, Upper chest, Middle chest, Biceps, Triceps
- Logged as
- Assistance × reps
Loads from YouTube only when you press play. The video is by an independent creator.
Why do it
The band lets you rehearse the whole muscle up, including the tricky transition, before you have the strength to do it alone. It suits people who already have solid pull-ups and dips but get stuck where the pull turns into a press. The band helps most at the bottom, so it adds speed to your pull, but you still have to get your chest over the bar yourself. Use the lightest band that allows clean reps, and step down a band once they feel smooth.
How to do it
Loop a band over the bar and place one knee or both feet in the bottom of the loop. Grab the bar overhand about shoulder-width apart with your wrists over the top of the bar.
Pull explosively, driving the bar toward your lower chest instead of your chin. As the bar reaches your chest, lean your shoulders forward over it.
Turn your wrists over the bar, bring your elbows up behind it and press yourself up until your arms are straight above the bar.
Lower yourself under control to a hang. Log the band you used; a lighter band counts as progress, until you can do muscle ups without one.
Common mistakes
Pulling to your chin
A pull that stops at chin height leaves you under the bar with nowhere to go. Drive the bar toward your lower chest so you have room to lean over it.
Hanging with your wrists under the bar
A normal hanging grip makes it hard to turn your hands over at the top. Set your wrists over the top of the bar before you start the pull.
Kicking through the transition
A leg kick plus the band's rebound can get you over the bar without learning the turn. Lean your shoulders forward and bring your elbows up behind the bar on purpose.
Dropping from the top
Falling back to a hang wastes the lowering, which trains the same path in reverse. Bend your elbows, roll back under the bar and lower under control.
Sets, reps and progression
How many sets you do and how close to failure you take them depend on your goal and your week, not on the exercise. These guides cover it:
Alternatives that train the same thing
Same movement, a different angle or piece of equipment.
