Everyone wants to grow and maximize their booty gains, but most people simply don’t know how! Most people are doing air squats or glute kickbacks with poor form and wonder why their glutes are not growing. Today, most females are trying to maintain the hour-glass physique with a thin waist and wide hips. One of the best ways to to achieve this look is to grow your booty. Specifically, targeting the side glutes! This will make your hips appear wider and make your waist appear thiner.
However, guys should be taking my advice from this article as well! Most men have weak glutes and poor glute development. These causes them to be extremely quad dominant. This is a problem, and will set you up for injuries and pain later in life. Everyone could benefit from doing the exercises listed below. To grow your glutes, you need to be doing a wide variety of exercises and progressively making them more challenging. You can make these exercises more challenging by adding weight, adding resistance bands, and increasing reps/sets. I recommend a hip circle to maximize your booty gains. Check out my article on the best resistance bands for booty gains.
This article is going to discuss the reasons why everyone should be training their glutes, and tips to maximize booty gains. I will be going over the 10 best exercises for booty gains below.
Why Everyone Should Do Booty Exercises
Every single person could benefit from training their glutes. Not just females and not just athletes. Some guys think it will ruin their reputation if they are seen in the gym doing hip thrusts. Trust me no one cares, and it looks better than curling in the squat rack! Not only will this benefit your overall physique, but you will maximize your ability to grow your lower-body in general. Incorporating booty exercises into your routine will improve your strength, power, and speed with everything. Most of an athlete’s power and speed comes from the hips, specifically the glutes.
Another benefit of targeting the booty is reducing low back pain and knee pain. I know a lot of people who suffer from back pain, and it often is because their glutes simply aren’t doing their job. The gluteus maximus and gluteus medius help control the pelvis and are designed to take load/pressure off the low back. However, when these muscles are weak and deactivated the load/pressure will be put on the back. A strong booty will take the load off the knees as well. The gluteus medius or “side glute”, is designed to stabilize the pelvis, and when strengthened it helps change the forces through the knees. So, not only will adding booty exercises grow your glutes, increase strength, improve power, increase speed, but will also help protect your body from injuries!
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The Best Exercises For Booty Gains
#1 Barbell Hip Thrust
The barbell hip thrust is hand down one of the single best exercises for booty growth. I recommend starting first without the bar, and just getting a feel for the exercise. However, once you get this exercise down it is one of the best exercises to load weight on the bar. You will be surprised just how much weight you can hip thrust. I recommend putting a barbell pad on the bar so it is comfortable. Also, this is a great exercise to incorporate a hip circle during the movement. You slip the hip circle around your thighs, and it will be a cue for you to keep your knees pulled apart during the hip thrust. Adding a hip circle with definitely grow the booty, and help target the side glutes.
#2 Sumo Squats
Number 2 on the list is the sumo squat. This is a variation of the normal squat, but it will put more of an emphasis on the booty. This is due to the angle of your legs while squatting down. During a normal squat most people do not target the glutes as well, and mainly only target their quads. With a sumo squat you turn your feet out wide and drop straight down. I recommend holding a dumbbell or kettlebell during this movement. You will definitely feel this in your glutes and side glutes!
#3 Glute Kickbacks
The glute kickback is one of the best exercises for booty gains. You can do this standing or on your hands & knees. I recommend using a hip circle or circular resistance band when doing glute kickbacks. This is a great exercises especially to do at home. Make sure not to arch your back and squeeze your butt at the very top! You will be surprised how much you feel these. Complete a few sets per leg and keep the rep range high around 15-20 reps.
#4 Hip Abduction
Hip Abduction is a great exercise to strengthen your glutes and grow your side booty. This exercise can be done in standing or lying on your side. Lying on your side will be a more challenging variation due to gravity. I recommend purchasing small rubber resistance band loops that can go around your ankles. This is the best exercise to target the gluteus medius aka side booty. By targeting the gluteus medius you can help widen your hips and get the hourglass figure. Guys should be targeting the side glutes as well. These muscles are often weak in some of the biggest guys in the gym!
#5 Bulgarian Splits Squats
The Bulgarian Split Squat is one of my favorite exercises. You won’t even need much weight for this exercise, and can get a great booty workout with just your bodyweight. I recommend holding onto something at first, because it can be hard to balance at first. Focus on keeping good form, and try to go at-least down to a 90degree angle for the front knee. You can lean forward like in the image above to target more of the glutes rather than the quads.
#6 Single Leg Bridge
Number 6 on our list is the single leg bridge. This exercise is a great booty exercise that can be done nearly anywhere! You won’t need much weight, and will definitely feel this exercise. The single leg bridge is similar to the hip thrust, but only on one leg. So the pelvis will be required to stabilize more during this exercise. If you don’t stabilize, then the pelvis will drop to one side during the bridge. I recommend holding the other leg straight and in-line with the thigh of your leg doing the bridge. Like shown in the image. Make sure to go all the way up and squeeze your butt at the very top. Give this one a try during your next booty workout!
#7 Romanian Deadlifts (RDL)
One of my all time favorite exercises for posterior chain development. This is a fantastic exercise for the glutes, hamstrings, and spinal erectors. The only problem with this exercise is most people struggle with their form. I recommend watching yourself doing this exercise in the mirror or have a friend check your form. It is important to have correct form during this exercise to avoid any injuries. Make sure to hinge at the hips and keep your back straight during the exercise. Squeeze your butt at the very top. It can be helpful beginning with dumbbells before progressing to a straight barbell.
#8 Squats
We could not forget about the good-ole squat. The squat is one of the single best exercises anyone can perform! You can build a fantastic lower-body by just performing this exercise. However, the squat targets the entire lower-body especially the quadriceps. So, although the squat does target the booty, the other exercises listed above will help development the booty directly. I recommend to start with the classic air squat before adding any weight.
#9 Lunges
Lunges are one of my favorite bodyweight exercises. They can be done nearly anywhere.. at home, outside, at the hotel, you name it! You can do lunges with dumbbells at your side or add a barbell on your shoulders. I recommend starting with just your bodyweight, and make sure to keep a good 90 degree angle at both legs. You can either step forward to lunge or step back for a reverse lunge. The more you lean forward the more emphasis you will put on your glutes. You can get creative with the lunge, and do variations like the jump lunge, side lunge, etc. This will mix it up, and target different parts of the booty. Add a hip circle to make it more challenging!
#10 Monster Walks
The ultimate booty burner is the monster walks. The monster walk can be done with a simple loop resistance band around your feet, ankles, or thighs. Research shows more glute medius or side glute activation by placing the resistance band around the feet as compared to the thighs. So give it a try! You can use either a fabric hip circle around the thighs or use a small rubber loop around the feet. To complete the monster walk, take a big step in a forward/lateral direction then repeat with the other leg. Then do the same thing in reverse! So take a step backwards in a lateral direction and repeat with the other leg. You will really feel the burn with this exercise. I recommend adding this to the end of your booty workout as a burnout.
Final Thoughts
Listed above are hands down the top exercises to help build and strengthen the booty. I recommend incorporating these exercises into a solid leg routine to maximize your booty gains. Remember it it important to switch it up and increase the challenge from week to week. That way your body doesn’t get used to doing the same exercises every week. The best way to see results fast is to keep your body guessing each week! Most of the exercises listed above can be done with a hip circle resistance band. I strongly encourage adding a hip circle resistance band into your leg workout to maximize your results. Give these exercises a try, and you will be on your way to achieving the booty gains!
