Do More Workouts Build More Muscle? The Science Behind Effective Training
More Workouts Don’t Equal More Results
Someone asked if working out 4 times a week is enough to gain muscle
And it’s alarming just how conditioned we’ve been to believe that more is always better.
This mindset shows up everywhere:
- Spending half a workout kicking your leg back on the Stairmaster, thinking the longer you feel your glutes burning, the bigger they’ll get.
- Trying to hit every single muscle group every day, fearing you’ll miss out on progress otherwise.
- Piling on countless sets of random exercises that don’t even align with their goal.
The truth is, it’s not about how long you train or how many days you train. It’s about the strategy behind your workouts.
You could train two days, three days, four days, five days, or even six days a week, and any of those could be enough—or not.
When it comes to building muscle, these factors make the difference:
Exercise selection: Are you hitting your muscles from different angles and positions?Intensity: Are you challenging yourself each set or are you breezing through them?Volume: How many reps and sets are you doing for the muscle groups you’re trying to grow—not just in one workout, but across the week?For instance, imagine 2 people both working out 4 days a week, (2 upper-body days and 2 lower-body days)
- Person A’s program looks like this:
Lower body days: Squats, Romanian deadlifts (RDLs), step-ups, hamstring curls, and leg extensions
Upper body days: Bench press, rows, pull-downs, bicep curls, and tricep extensions.
- Person B’s program looks like this:
Lower body days: Kickbacks, clamshells, Instagram "booty" exercises, and 30 minutes on the Stairmaster.
Upper body days: Bicep curls, tricep extensions, lateral raises, push-ups, and band pull-aparts.
Both are working out 4 days a week, but only one program is designed for real muscle growth (hint: it’s not Person 
)
)In fact, you could train just 2 days a week with a well-designed plan and see better results than someone working out 4 days a week with an ineffective one.
So it’s not about how many days you train; it’s about what you do with those days.
A smart, structured routine that accounts for exercise selection, intensity, volume, and progression can be effective whether you’re training 2 days or 6.
The difference isn’t in the number of workouts you do—it’s in the strategy behind them.
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