What Is Progressive Overload & Why Do You Need It?

Many people in the fitness space talk about progressive overload for good reason: It is imperative to your success in weightlifting.

So if you’re wondering what progressive overload is and why you need it, you’re in the right place.

Progressive overload is simply a matter of increasing the weight, reps/sets and intensity of your workouts. The reason we do this is to keep our muscles challenged so that they can grow and we can avoid hitting a dreaded plateau.

What Is Progressive Overload & Why Do You Need It? Contents

What Is Progressive Overload

Benefits Of Progressive Overload

How To Achieve Progressive Overload In Your Workouts

Progressive Overload In Reps & Sets

Progressive Overload: Workout Intensity

Change Your Workouts

Why Progressive Overload Is Important

When To Start Progressive Overload

Progressive Overload Summary

What Is Progressive Overload

As already mentioned in the introduction to this article; progressive overload is about increasing the intensity of your workouts.

You can achieve progressive overload by adding weight, increasing the reps & sets, or adjusting the way you approach your workouts and each individual exercise.

Benefits Of Progressive Overload

Get Stronger

Build More Muscle

Keeps Workouts Interesting

Avoids Plateaus

How To Achieve Progressive Overload In Your Workouts

Usually the first way to approach progressive overload is to simply increase the amount of weight you are working with. Add a couple of extra plates to the bar, grab the heavier dumbbells, or move that pin on the machine down a notch and take an extra weight stack with you on the lift.

But keep in mind that adding weight is the simplest approach to progressive overload, and if you’ve been lifting for a while, you’re going to start needing more than “just lift more” to keep developing your muscles and strength.

Progressive Overload In Reps & Sets

How you approach your reps & sets has the power to result in you lifting more weight. This becomes especially crucial for experienced lifters.

We have covered various rep/set approaches on this website, you can use any and all of these (not at the same time) to help you lift more weight:

Trisets

Pyramid Sets

Drop Sets

Supersets

Giant Sets

The above is not an exhaustive list, just some of the most common options that lifters work with.

Progressive Overload: Workout Intensity

The above rep/set methods all contribute towards increasing the intensity of your workout, but there are also some other things you can do.

Time Under Tension

Time under tension supports progressive overload by keeping your muscles engaged for longer with every single rep.

Not only does this increase the intensity of your workout, it is also a great time to really hone in on your form. You’ll be surprised how slight tweaks to form can make all the difference in your heavier lifts.

Negative Sets

Also known as eccentric training, negative sets focus on the lowering phase of a movement. By slowing down this phase and controlling the weight, you can break through plateaus, increase strength, and stimulate greater muscle growth.

Pause Sets

Pause sets are another approach to progressive overload that helps to build strength by increasing the time under tension as you pause the exercise for an extended period of time at its midpoint.

Use Resistance Bands

Not on their own, add resistance bands to your lift so that you increase the resistance throughout the entire lift. Just secure the band to the bench or the floor and loop it around the weight you’re lifting.

Change Your Workouts

Another really important approach to progressive overload is to change your workout, introduce new lifts and identify your weaknesses so that you can make them your strengths.

Staying attached to the exercises you’re comfortable with isn’t helping you progressively overload. Different exercise variations will target each muscle group differently.

Squats alone are a good example, not all squats are equal, and we have illustrated this in our article; What Muscles Do Squats Work?

Also see; What Muscles Do Deadlifts Work?

Don’t do yourself a progressive overload injustice by failing to try new things!

We’ve got over 130 workouts and you can sample some for free here >>>

If you’d prefer to build your own workout plans check out how we have supported over 6000 women to learn to lift on their own terms >>>

Why Progressive Overload Is Important

Progressive overload is important for all lifters, you should always be working on developing your lifts, whether from the perspective of getting physically stronger and performing each lift better, or if you want to build more muscle mass.

Even if you want to burn body fat, or you’re in maintenance. If you’re not progressively overloading your lifts, you’re not developing your strength and skills as a lifter; you will plateau—don't say we didn't warn you!

When To Start Progressive Overload

Start immediately, well, after you’ve introduced yourself to lifting and are comfortable and confident performing all of the lifts in your workout. Then you need to always be strategising how you’re going to lift more.

Progressive Overload Summary

To summarise; progressive overload is about keeping your workouts physically challenging. There are a number of ways to approach progressive overload which go beyond simply reaching for more weight to lift.

This includes how you approach your workout as a whole, the way you perform your reps & sets all the way down to how you perform each individual exercise.

And don’t forget to switch up your overall workout routine and your training split to keep the plateaus away!