How to do Jump Squats

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Difficulty: Hard

Impact Level: High

Target Body Parts: calves, glutes, quadriceps

Instructions

Set yourself up as you would for a regular squat, feet at shoulder width, with you weight in your heels. Then to lower yourself into the bottom of the squat position, sit your hips backwards and down as you bend your knees whilst keeping a neutral spine with your chest upright and open. As you lower down, lift your arms up in front of you to shoulder height. Once you get to the bottom of your squat, your hips should be at knee height.

From the bottom stand up explosively and jump up off the floor as you pull your arms down and back behind your hips. At the top of your jump, your body should be straight and upright.

As you come down to land, keep your feet at shoulder width and as you plant them on the floor, push your hips back and down and bend your knees. This will soften the impact of your landing but also set you up straight into your next jump squat. Control yourself down to the bottom of the squat and repeat the explosive stand up and jump.

Watch out for the knees collapsing in together when you squat down. To avoid this, externally rotate the hips outwards and keep the knees out over the side edge of the feet.

How to make Jump Squats easier

To prepare for the complexity and impact of Jump Squats, try some regular Squats and Forward Lunges first.

How to make Jump Squats more challenging

Once you have mastered squats standing on two legs, check out our Single Leg Squats exercise.

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