Some of the links in this post may be affiliate links. If make a purchase through these links, we receive a commission at no extra cost to you. Please see our disclosure for more info.
Perhaps one of the easiest exercise movements, the standard push up activates nearly every muscle in your body, which yields far more than toned muscles and increased endurance. If you’re not convinced about adopting a push up routine into your exercise program, or you simply wish to understand the power of this simple exercise, continue reading to uncover the real benefits of doing push ups.
1. Increase Functional Strength via Full Body Activation
As you lower your body to the floor and the familiar “burn” begins to encompass your muscles the last thing you’re thinking about is the number of muscles you’re using. However, this is one of the top benefits of pushups. As you engage in this exercise, literally every major muscle in your body is called upon to execute the movement.
Major muscle groups, such as your biceps, core muscles, triceps, anterior deltoids and lower body muscle groups are activated to support your body while stabilizing your movements. Classified a a compound exercise – meaning multiple muscle groups are called upon – you train the most important muscles throughout your body. Have you ever wondered by a standard bench press is so easy when compared to a standard push up? This is why.
2. Muscle Stretching for Health and Vitality
One of the most underrated benefits of doing push ups is the stretch it provides to your biceps and back muscles. As you lower yourself to the floor, your back muscles are effectively stretched, and as you push yourself to the starting position your biceps obtain a full stretch. This not only improves your flexibility, which helps prevent injuries, but a well-stretched muscle feature a solid and attractive appearance.
3. Enhance Your Cardiovascular System
As stated earlier, push ups are classified as a compound exercise as it calls upon multiple muscle groups. When you simultaneously engage large muscle groups, your heart must work harder to deliver oxygen-rich blood to muscle tissue. Ultimately, this activity results in an effective cardiovascular exercise, which supports heart health and promotes the reduction of stored body fat.
4. Increase Whole Body Muscle Definition – HGH Promotion
Throughout the movements of a push up, you recruit a wide array of primary and stabilizing muscles. The more muscle mass that’s utilized in a strength training exercise, the greater the production and release of a specialized hormone known as HGH, or human growth hormone.
As a young man or woman, your body pumped out large concentrations of this specialized hormone to support the natural growth of your entire body. However, as you age the natural release of HGH declines, which makes building muscle a challenging task for older adults.
By calling upon such a wide array of muscles, the production of HGH is triggered, which ultimately results in muscle hypertrophy – or muscle growth. To maximize push up benefits, you must incorporate this exercise into your regular strength training program.
5. Protect Your Shoulders from Injury
One of the most debilitating, and common, injuries for older individuals is a rotator cuff injury. While the severity of this injury is based upon a host of unique circumstances, protecting this delicate part of your body must become a priority.
The standard push up has been found to be among the most effective ways to safeguard your shoulder joints from injury; especially in older adults. Because push ups call upon stabilizing muscles, which surround the rotator cuff joint, this area of the body is strengthened and conditioned for dynamic movements.
By supporting the strength and health of primary and secondary shoulder muscles, the likelihood of debilitating injuries significantly lowers.
6. Improve Your Posture
Whether you sit at a computer all day or simply ignored the nagging recommendations from your mother or teachers, improper posture can destroy your health and comfort as you age. One of the most common reasons for a lack of proper posture is weak core muscles.
In order to properly hold your shoulders and back, your entire core must be strong enough to support its vertical positions. When push ups are properly executed, the muscles responsible for supporting posture are strengthened and fine-tuned. Moreover, as you regularly engage in push ups, your body will naturally lean toward proper posture. This is one of the most influential passive benefits of push ups.
7. Prevent Lower Back Injuries
There are few injuries as debilitating as a lower back injury. This essential part of your body supports practically every movement, so if it’s damaged or injured even the simplest of tasks can become excruciatingly painful. As mentioned earlier, pushups call upon your entire torso to stabilize its movements. By doing so, you strengthen this vulnerable part of the body.
By developing strength in this specific portion of your body, you cultivate muscles responsible for reducing lower back pressure, which is imperative to prevent and treat low back injuries.
8. Save Time While Cultivating a Strong Body
When surveys are conducted to determine why an individual does not exercise more the most common answer is a lack of time. We live increasingly busy lives, and while exercising is essential for a healthy body, it’s most commonly the first activity eliminated from a daily list of chores.
Although you may not have time for a traditional strength training or cardiovascular workout, if you have five minutes you can achieve a full-body workout with push ups. Want to add variation to this swift and potent exercise movement? Delve into the many different hand and feet placements to target muscles from different angles, which supports rapid strength and size development.
9. No Cost for a Full Body Workout
Although you may have a desire to join a world-class gym, their monthly dues may not fit in your tight budget. Thankfully, you don’t need an expensive gym membership – or even any equipment – to obtain an effective and thorough full body workout.
By engaging in push up exercises, you effectively fatigue major and minor muscle groups, which provide the same benefits as a traditional full body exercise performed at the gym on expensive and cumbersome equipment.
10. Increase Testosterone and Reduce Osteoporosis Development
As men and women age, the concentration of various hormones begin to dwindle. For men, the most prominent loss is the reduction of circulating testosterone. While preliminary evidence requires further investigation, several studies suggest the simple movements within a standard push up promotes testosterone production, which is essential for a healthy body in both men and women.
Moreover, weight bearing exercises, such as the standard push up, supports stronger, more dense bones. This increase in bone density may ward off debilitating skeletal system disorders, such as osteoporosis.
Thank you for this nice information. I am going to add this exercise in my homework out.
I am 70 yrs old female, I started doing push ups three weeks ago. I am up to one set of 17 as my new yrs resolution. My goal by summer is 50? Thanks for the great information.
I did over 1000 push-ups and wow I performed better than ever at my sprinting and fighting capability thank you.
A good starter plan:
Day 1: 1 pushups
Day 2-5: rest
Day 6; try 2 pushups
Day 7: rest
Day 8: repeat Day 1
Day 9: rest
Day 10: do 3 Pushups
Day 11-13: rest
Day 14: do 4 pushups
If you get this far, you’re 4x stronger in 2 weeks!
I really love exercise
am 23years and I can hit 60push ups in a single go
Wow I will start doing these to prevent injuries whilst performing.
When I started to do Push Up. I Hardly can manage to do 10 in a go, But then I started to increase 1 push up daily and now I do over 25 in a single go. Also, I do them twice in a day.
I can complete 40 good pushup and 55 sloppy ones. Needless to say, I don’t have a problem with this exercise and I still hate it. I just think that’s strange.
3 years ago, I was 74, I started doing push-ups every morning as I get out of bed. I was doing 40 to 50. Adding one or two weekly as I progressed. Today, I’m 77 and this morning, I did my 80 push-ups non stop! Those numbers may be astonishing but the best part of the story is how great I feel everyday and enjoying a very healthy life.
Thanks for your article, it’s a little push forward to continue pushing-up!
I do 100-200 press ups a day asking with 100-200 sit ups and 100-200 squats a day. I never go above or below these numbers and I do in batches of 25! Great article by the way!
85 yrs of age ,very healthy but weak wrists. What do you suggest for a pushup
I am just a teenager who is 13 years old. I am in a campaign of doing 100 pushups every day for 30 days. I have done it effectively and I see changes in triceps, chest and shoulders. Doing pushups is really a good workout.
i ve started my 1 month pushup challenge (100 pushups daily )
No need to do more only 100 push ups at morning and 100 push ups at evening can help us for building good physique.try it for long time surely you all getting better results mostly it will help for young generation.for above 35 age people I suggest only 100 push ups on regular basis
I would to share my experience in quarantine due to coronavirus , although i do exercise at gym 4 times a week but i couldnt to 10 straight pushups , i start by 3 sets and 10 for every set , after less than 20 days i can do 100 pushups divided on 4 or 5 sets , and really feel my chest muscles developed better than working out at gym
Actually exercise @ gym is a total cardiovascular but pushup is a specific exercise that helps for strength of muscle.
A very helpful information. Push ups can help us so well and I thank you for sharing this awareness. Keep sharing.
Thank you for an informative article. Indeed pushups is the best for people who can not afford paying for gyms. Good sets after jogging or walking , one can face the day without fear.
i always do them. they are very essential to start a day
Excellent article.
I am not 80 years old and I’ve been doing press ups for the past 50 year and do 40 press ups each morning. I have found I have not had to reduce the number of press ups despite advancing years. Highly recommend this quick form of exercise .
This was a Great article, full of valuable info! Wasting no more time thinking about what exercises to do, pushups it will be!! Thanks!!
Great information. I think more people should start incorporating push-ups into their workouts and training. Rotator cuff injuries are all too common and could be prevented in most cases from simple exercises that strengthen and support your core and shoulders.
One of my favorite things about push-ups is that there are so many variations you can do to focus on different muscle groups or make the exercise easier or more difficult if you need to.
Thanks for the information. Pushups are great. Just be careful of you are older. A couple of years ago I was doing 500- 700 a day (sets of 50, would do at least one set an hour) and eventually had wrist and elbow problems.
That’s a very good article sharing with us. push up exercise is very important in our life if you do push up for daily basis you feel very strongly all the time and you easily get up the heavy weight and you can safe yourself to back injuries so just do daily push up exercise just and you will feel strength power
Really awesomely & in a simple manner explained.. i seriously have started enjoying push ups …as i can feel myself fresh doing this exercise..
Thanks.I am gonna try to lose weight now.
Wow! this is really enlightening. Thank you for this!
Exercise is most important for everyone. When you can 10 push up daily you can feel better thanks for sharing this is very informative for me
A very detailed and well explained article I can attest to the benefits of doing push ups ever since I’m doing push ups for several years I noticed an overall change on my health like for example I don’t get tired easily and I can do more strenuous stuff and chores and my physical physique is even better than when I’m not doing any workout at all. Plus it’s free and you can almost do it anytime anywhere all you need is a flat ground and you’re good to go. Kudos to your article hope this helps more people and inspire them to work out for a good and healthy living
Would doing push-ups on a daily basis have the same effect or lead to burn out?
Thank you for this useful information. I had no idea such a simple exercise could have so many benefits. I’m going to start doing them today. Thanks.
I’m 55 yrs old about to turn 56, been doing push-ups for years. Started barely able to do 20/set. Now I can do up to 120/set 4 to 5 sets at least 3 times a week. I hope I’m not overdoing it. It does take me a little over an to finish 5sets, but I’m in the comfort of my home
Thank you this was very informative.
excellent article thank you !
Just did 100
Hasta luego
When I started push up daily in early morning i could hardly finish 10 push up.Now i try to do at least 25 push up.I feel change in my body,my muscle got tight and my shoulder injury also get comfort.Thank you for this article.
Just completed 25 and 50 jumping Jack’s started off with 10 pushups 2 weeks ago
Thank you for such a great informative write up on push ups.