Should you train to failure?

Should you train to failure?

Building muscle takes hard work, but does this mean you should take every set to complete muscle failure? If we look at the research, we see that you don’t need to train to failure and can build muscle equally well if you leave 1 or 2 repetitions in reserve [1].

By not training to failure on every set (while staying close to failure by maintaining 1-2 Reps In Reserve), you preserve energy for the later exercises in your workout and can train with more volume. You will also be more recovered for your next workouts [2].

With that said, it’s still good to sometimes push yourself to failure to test your strength limits. By testing your strength on the compound lifts every 4 weeks or so, you can more effectively gauge your repetitions in reserve and make sure that you do not train too far away from failure. Also, on isolation exercises, you can go to failure more often since these exercises produce low fatigue.

So while I suggest you keep 1-2 reps in reserve most of the time during your working sets, there definitely still is a time and place for training to muscle failure.