Burpees: technique, variations and when to skip them

Burpees show up in two places: at the end of a class, when the coach wants everyone breathing hard, and in home sessions, when there is no kit and no time. The question worth asking is whether they earn that slot or whether they are just a fast way to feel wrecked.

The honest answer is that a burpee does one job very well and several others badly. It is excellent for conditioning and for training with nothing at all. It is a poor choice if you are after muscle size or maximum strength. And it turns risky when it is done fast, tired and in high numbers, because technique gives out long before willpower does.

What a burpee is and which muscles it works

A burpee stitches three movements together in one rep: a squat down with the hands to the floor, a jump back into a plank with a press-up, then a return of the feet and a jump up. Almost the whole body is involved, but no single muscle group takes enough load to grow much from it.

The quads and glutes do the most, since they own the descent, the take-off and the landing. The chest, triceps and front delts handle the press-up. The abs, obliques and hip flexors hold the body in line during the plank, and the calves work on the jump.

The real effect is on the heart, the lungs and your tolerance for being uncomfortable. Twenty seconds of burpees will raise your heart rate faster than almost anything you can do with a barbell, because the arms and legs alternate and the body keeps travelling up and down. That is also why so many people dislike them: the pulse spikes early and the breathing never settles.

How to do it, step by step

1. Stand tall, feet about hip-width apart, weight through the middle of the foot.
2. Squat down and plant your palms shoulder-width apart, roughly a hand's length in front of your toes.
3. Shift the weight onto your hands and jump or step the feet back into a plank. Head, hips and heels form one line.
4. Squeeze the glutes and brace the stomach so the hips do not drop towards the floor.
5. Lower your chest to the floor with the elbows tucked to about 45 degrees, not flared straight out.
6. Press back up to the plank without letting the hips rise ahead of the shoulders.
7. Jump or step the feet back towards the hands so they land under the hips rather than well behind them.
8. Stand up and jump, arms overhead. Land on the ball of the foot, let the heel settle, knees slightly bent.

Breathing is simple: exhale as you press out of the bottom and as you jump, inhale on the way down. Holding your breath through the whole rep is the usual reason people go light-headed in the third or fourth set.

The mistakes that cost you

Sagging hips in the plank. Once the midsection lets go, the lower back absorbs the load on every rep. That is the quickest route to a dull ache the next morning, and it is the opposite of what actually protects the spine.

Belly-flopping the press-up. Instead of a controlled descent, people drop onto the floor and snake back up. The elbows swing out to 90 degrees, the shoulder loads in its worst position, and the reps count for nothing.

A heavy landing. Landing stiff-legged on the heels sends a jolt straight up the shin. A good landing is quiet. If you can hear yourself through the floor, it is too hard, and repeated over hundreds of reps it is exactly the sort of loading that sensible knee injury prevention tries to keep under control.

Hands too far ahead of the feet. The feet then cannot land under the body on the way in, so the lower back rounds to make up the difference.

Sprinting from rep one. If the first five reps are flat out, rep ten is a completely different exercise. Pick a pace where the last rep of the set still looks like the first.

Easier variations

Step-back burpee. Walk one foot back at a time instead of jumping. The heart rate still climbs, but there is no impact at all.

Hands elevated. Palms on a bench or step 40 to 60 centimetres high takes load off the shoulders and makes the press-up manageable. This is the most useful version for anyone who cannot yet do five clean press-ups from the floor.

No press-up. Move into the plank, hold for half a second, come back. Often called a squat thrust.

No jump at the top. Stand up and reach the arms overhead instead. You lose almost all the impact and keep nearly all the conditioning benefit.

Slow tempo. One rep every five seconds. It sounds far too easy until you do twelve in a row.

Harder variations

Strict burpee. Chest and thighs touch the floor, hands lift briefly off the ground, then a press-up with no snaking. Much harder than it looks on paper.

Broad jump burpee. Replace the vertical jump with a forward jump of 60 to 100 centimetres. Needs space and a clean landing.

Burpee over an obstacle. A lateral hop over a low bench or a bar adds a change of direction while you are already fatigued.

Dumbbell burpee. Hands on the dumbbells, then press or snatch them overhead once you stand. This is the only version that genuinely adds load to the muscles, and it only works if the overhead technique is already solid.

Burpee pull-up. Perform the burpee under a bar and finish each rep with a pull-up. Worth doing only when your pull-up is clean and free of swing.

What to do instead if burpees do not suit you

A burpee already needs no equipment, so the real question is what to use when the burpee itself is the problem: sore wrists, an unhappy shoulder, or neighbours downstairs.

• Squat thrusts and mountain climbers give a similar heart rate with no jump and no press-up.
• Kettlebell swings are the closest match for breathing hard without going to the floor. It pays to sort out the technique and breathing in the swing first, because errors multiply fast in sets of 20.
• Sled work is the best option when your joints will not take impact. Pushing and dragging a sled drives the pulse just as high with almost no eccentric loading, so it leaves you far less sore.
• Skipping, fast step-ups, a bike or a rower all do the same job if conditioning is the only goal.
• A no-jump pairing: 10 bodyweight squats and 5 press-ups, five rounds, no rest.

Sets and reps

Burpees are not programmed like a bench press. Keep the reps per set low and the rest honest.

• Beginner: 3 sets of 5 to 8 reps, 60 to 90 seconds of rest, twice a week.
• Intervals: 20 seconds of work, 40 seconds of rest, 8 to 10 rounds.
• Every minute on the minute: 5 reps at the top of each minute, rest for the remainder, 8 to 12 minutes total.
• As a finisher: 3 to 5 minutes at the end of a session, and no more.

For most people, 100 to 200 reps a week is plenty. End the set when the technique slips or when the reps get visibly slower, not when you reach a number you decided on in advance.

Tests like a hundred burpees for time are competition, not training. If you have never done one, the first attempt is not the place to find out.

Who they suit, and when to leave them out

They suit you if you have 20 minutes and no equipment, if you travel, if your sport involves repeatedly getting off the floor, or if you want a straightforward way to raise your weekly energy output without a gym.

Swap them for an easier version, or drop them entirely, if you have fresh lower back pain, if your shoulder complains during press-ups, if your wrists hurt in the plank position, or if your knees object to landing. The same goes for the weeks straight after an injury, while you are still rebuilding range of motion. If the shoulder is the sticking point, it is worth knowing what actually helps shoulders in the gym before adding more reps on top.

If you are over 50 and coming back after a break, start with the step-back, no-jump version and add the jump only once the landing is quiet and controlled. That fits the wider pattern of training sensibly at 50, where impact work gets phased in rather than switched on.

One more thing: burpees are not a punishment. Used as a penalty for turning up late or missing a rep, they get done tired and careless, which is precisely the combination that produces injuries.

When to see a doctor

Speak to a doctor before starting high-intensity intervals if you have a known heart condition, uncontrolled blood pressure, or you have been fully inactive for over a year.

Do not put off a check-up if you get chest pain, breathlessness out of proportion to the effort, dizziness or fainting during a session. The same applies to pain lasting more than two weeks, numbness or weakness in an arm or leg, and severe swelling with dark urine in the days after an unusually large number of reps.

The short version

• Burpees are a conditioning tool, not a muscle-building one.
• Keep the body in line in the plank, elbows at 45 degrees, and land quietly.
• No press-up from the floor yet? Put your hands on a bench.
• Sets of 5 to 8 with real rest beat long sets done badly.
• If your back, shoulder or knee hurts during burpees, change the exercise rather than grit your teeth.