How to build muscle on your lower body with resistance bands

May 26, 2024

Who doesn’t love leg days? Even if you’re not a big fan, a lower body workout means you’re faster on your feet and less likely to experience aches and pains. This helps you get through runs, workouts, or even daily walks while feeling and looking better all the way around.

Let’s be honest: Creating an effective workout routine to strengthen your lower body involves more than just leg day. No matter your goals, the variety of moves you can build into your exercises remains endless. You’ll find many fun and effective workouts for your specific goals as you learn how your muscles work and why you need to train them.

You can also build muscle with resistance bands, which work in a similar way to free weights. They give your muscles resistance to work against, and you’ll grow stronger as a result. Here’s how it works, along with some of our favorite resistance bands workouts.

The lower body begins at the hip and goes all the way to your toes. This includes the hip bone, knee, and ankle joints. It also involves major muscle groups like the glutes, quads, hamstrings, adductors, and calves.

Lower body workouts engage many large muscle groups that improve your overall fitness level, athletic performance, and healthy movement patterns. Other benefits include:

Believe it or not, the benefits don’t even end there. Lower body workouts can also help with:

Here’s what to consider when looking for the best resistance bands for your lower body workouts.

Look for bands with different strength or tension levels. If you’re just starting, choose a band with less strength or tension. These are often yellow, while black bands have more strength and tension, but be sure to confirm depending on the manufacturer. Choose between three to five resistance levels because your needs will change as you get stronger.

If you can, try the bands out before you buy them. Make sure they don’t snap or get stuck while you’re using them. Generally speaking, thicker bands last longer. Check them out before each workout after you buy them, too. If you see breaks or damages, don’t use them. Those snaps can hurt! It’s basically like getting smacked with a giant rubber band. No fun.

You can buy elastic, fabric, or rubber latex resistance bands. Fabric brands can be more comfortable and last longer. They also don’t roll up or move around while working out. This can be great for lower body exercises. On the plus side, latex resistance bands stretch more, which is also helpful for upper body exercises and stretching.

Squats are a convenient and inexpensive way to build muscles and increase strength. Good resistance bands add some challenges to make squats even more effective.

Muscles targeted

How to perform

Deadlifting is one of the best full-body exercises because it adds mass to your frame while increasing strength.

Muscles targeted

How to perform

Experiment with a few bands to find the best tension for you when you begin these resistance-band glute bridges or any lower body workout with resistance bands. Alternatively, you can start with a medium band and then go lighter or harder as needed.

Muscles targeted

How to perform

Simple exercises like fire hydrants can be an at-home lower body workout, but you can do them anywhere. This is especially helpful if you’re on the road and can’t get to a gym. A resistance band will also increase the intensity.

Muscles targeted

How to perform

Strong calves will positively affect running, cycling, and any team or individual sport. You will also become more stable and, therefore, stronger when doing squats and deadlifts.

Muscles targeted

How to perform

This might feel funny, but it’s a great way to stabilize and strengthen your hips!

Muscles targeted

How to perform

If you need guidance on how to incorporate the exercises mentioned above into a full workout, give the example workout below a try!