Pull-Ups Explained: Muscles, Technique, and Progressions
Intro
Pull-ups are one of those movements that you can’t cheat. Either you can pull your own bodyweight up to a bar… or you can’t. As a coach, I’ve always loved that about them - they’re honest, effective, and they carry over into real-world strength better than almost any other upper-body lift. It’s also quite a testament to the work put in when you
But what’s actually happening behind the scenes.. Which muscles do pull-ups really train? And why are they so valuable if you care about strength, posture, muscle growth, and longevity?
In this article, I’ll break down exactly what pull-ups work, how they work, how to progress them, and why everyone from beginners to experienced lifters - should have some form of pull-up work in their program.
Let’s get into it.
What Actually Is a Pull-Up?
A pull-up is a vertical pulling movement where you hang from a bar with your palms facing away from you, then pull your chest up towards the bar until your chin clears it. That’s the standard strict pull-up. No kipping, no swinging, and don’t be kicking your legs around squirming either.
Chin-ups (palms facing you) are similar, and in some ways a bit easier for most people because they bring the biceps in more. Neutral-grip pull-ups (palms facing each other) sit somewhere in the middle and tend to be shoulder-friendly, I start most people here as it recruits a little more muscle making it easier to engage the lats so it’s a quicker path to getting your first bodyweight reps.
Regardless of variation, what they all have in common is this:
Your full bodyweight is the load
You move through a full range of motion
Your shoulder blades must actively move, stabilise, and control
Your grip must support everything you do
Your core needs to brace throughout
This makes pull-ups one of the most “complete” upper-body lifts you can do.
The Primary Muscles Worked in Pull-Ups
Muscles Worked During The Pull-Up
1. Lats (Latissimus Dorsi) - The Prime Mover
The lats are the huge muscles that run from your upper arm down to your lower back. They’re responsible for shoulder extension - pulling your arms down towards your body.
On a pull-up, the lats do the majority of the work, especially in the mid-range. If you feel your pull-ups in your armpit area, your lats are doing their job.
Stronger lats = stronger pull-ups, stronger rows, stronger deadlifts, and even better posture.
2. Upper Back (Traps, Rhomboids, Rear Delts)
When you initiate a pull-up correctly, you don’t just start pulling with your arms — you start with your shoulder blades.
Your scapula retracts (moves back) and depresses (moves down), and this activates:
Middle traps
Lower traps
Rhomboids
Rear delts
These muscles keep your shoulders stable, control your position, and protect you from shoulder stress. Weak upper-back muscles usually lead to:
Flaring elbows
Rounded shoulders
“Shrugging” pull-ups
Pain at the bottom of the rep
A strong upper back fixes all of that, i’ll usually keep a close eye on what is going on with clients scapulas and at first i’ll have them finish the movement in an active hang and a slight bend in the elbows rather than a full passive dead-hang so that we can focus on keeping the scapula engaged.
3. Biceps - The Secondary Worker
Some people underplay the biceps in a pull-up, but they’re heavily involved. They flex the elbow and pull you upward, especially in a chin-up (palms facing you). Less so in a pull up with a wide-ish grip.
If your biceps are a weak link, your chin-ups will be limited by arm strength instead of back strength and you’ll likely fail the rep just before your chin clears the bar.
4. Forearms & Grip
You can have the strongest back in the world, but if you can’t hang onto the bar, your pull-ups will never improve.
Pull-ups hammer:
Forearms
Finger flexors
Wrist stabilisers
Grip endurance
This grip strength carries over to deadlifts, rows, farmer’s walks, and everyday life and it builds quickly as well, so don’t be getting straps and attaching them to the pull up bars. I see people in the gym do this all of the time and I think to myself if you just trained your grip it would get stronger. If you can deadlift your bodyweight then you should be able to do a pull up and if you can’t then get to work on that.
5. Core & Trunk Stability
A strict pull-up is a full-body tension exercise.
Your core must stay braced to prevent:
Swinging
Arching
Over-kicking
“Fish-tailing” on the way up
The core activation in a strict pull-up is significant — especially if you perform hollow-body style reps. There was a study done on this which shows EMG data activates a lot during a pull up making it a legitimate ab exercise (citation).
Why Pull-Ups Are One of the Best Strength Movements
1. They Build Real-World Strength
Being able to pull yourself up is a genuinely useful skill. Climbing, lifting, hauling, bracing - these are human movement patterns. If you’ve ever spoken to me in person, you’ll know that generally I’m a big fan of any movements where we’re moving our own bodies through space, they’re great for control, neural adaptions and recruiting muscle.
Pull-ups build:
Body control
Grip strength
Back strength
Shoulder stability
Full-body tension
These qualities matter in sport, manual labour, and general health.
2. Huge Return on Time Investment
Pull-ups hit:
Back
Arms
Forearms
Core
…all at once.
It’s one of the highest-value exercises you can spend 10 minutes on.
3. Great for Posture & Shoulder Health
Most people’s training - and daily habits - are anterior-dominant they put your shoulders rounded in internal roatation:
Phones
Laptops
Driving
Pressing movements in the gym
Pull-ups strengthen the muscles that pull you out of that rounded posture.
If you want healthier shoulders, a stronger upper back, and a more athletic posture, pull-ups should be a staple. Also if you’ve ever just hung from a bar in a dead hang you can feel it decompressing your spine and stretching all of the main muscle groups in the upper body, also great for shoulder health, look up dead hang - shoulder benefits!
4. They Scale With You Forever
You can always make a pull-up harder:
Weighted pull-ups
Slow eccentrics
Paused pull-ups
One-arm variations
L-sits
Gymnastic progressions
Unlike machines, where you eventually “max them out,” pull-ups scale infinitely.
Common Mistakes People Make with Pull-Ups (And Fixes)
1. Not Controlling the Eccentric (The Way Down)
Dropping from the top instantly:
Removes half the benefit - Load the muscles don’t just let gravity do it’s thing.
Reduces muscle growth - see above, we load the muscles in the eccentric.
Slows progress - it is hard to measure if you’re just using momentum and gravity.
Beats up the elbows - dropping down hard onto tendons isn’t fun and even less fun when you add weight.
Fix:
Lower for 2–3 seconds every rep, seems excessive but you’ll count to 3 and it will definitely be less than 3, trust me I video my top sets..
2. Pulling Only With the Arms
If your elbows flare and your back feels “offline,” you’re pulling too much with your biceps.
Fix:
Start every rep with a scapular pull — set the shoulders, then pull.
3. Overly Wide Grips
“Wide grip for wide lats” is a myth. if you don’t believe me do a lat pull down with the standard bar then go grab two handles and take a close grip and you’ll see for yourself.
Wide grip reduces range, weakens the movement, and stresses the shoulders, it’ll put way more stress on your rotator cuffs, if you want to widen it over time you take small adjustments over a period of weeks.
Fix:
Use a grip just outside shoulder width.
4. Kipping
I only coach strict pull ups, I know they kip in Crossfit and i’m sure there is a skill element to it but I’d consider it more skill work and more related to gymnastics.. also I can’t actually do it, nor have I tried.
How to Get Your First Pull-Up (or Get Better at Them)
1. Scapular Pulls
Hang from the bar and pull your shoulder blades down without bending your elbows.
This teaches proper initiation.
2. Assisted Pull-Ups (Band or Machine)
The key here is:
Use assistance that allows good form without completely removing effort. Every client of mine uses the assisted machine at the gym I train out of in York and I have got lots of people their first pull up.
3. Negative Pull-Ups
Jump or step up to the top, then lower slowly for 3–5 seconds.
Brilliant for strength if you can’t yet do full reps.
4. Inverted Rows
Great for beginners and heavier lifters. Learn the pattern without the full load.
5. Weighted Pull-Ups (For Advanced Lifters)
That is me performing a 90kg Bodyweight +25kg Plate set of weighted pull ups
If you can hit 6–8 clean reps, start adding weight:
Dip belt
Weighted vest
Holding a dumbbell between your feet (I find this awkward, others don’t)
Weighted pull-ups are unmatched for genuine back strength and muscle building in my experience.
Programming Pull-Ups Into Your Training
For Strength:
3–5 sets
3–6 reps
2–3 minutes rest
Weighted when strong enough.
Stop maxing out every session, treat it like a strength move and leave a rep or two in the tank so that you can accumulate a decent amount of volume at the right intensity.
For Muscle Growth:
3–4 sets
6–8 reps
Controlled tempo
Focus on full range.
I prefer lower reps in general for the pull up, I sometimes have clients do one ‘heavier day’ and then one lighter day with higher reps because I believe that practicing the movement twice a week is beneficial for expediting your first bodyweight pull up BUT I do program lots of other back work that is less fatiguing in higher rep ranges where it makes sense to.
For Endurance:
Max-rep sets, ladders, EMOMs, etc.
(These are great for people who want conditioning + strength.) - My client Chris who’s story I posted about recently does these.
Pull-Ups and Longevity
One of the biggest predictors of ageing well is grip strength, and I have a study for that one too (citation)
Pull-ups train grip every single rep.
Combine that with the posture benefits, back strength, core stability, and shoulder control… and you’ve got one of the best “ageing-well” exercises available.
If you’re 40+, pull-ups might be the one upper-body exercise worth keeping for as long as possible (even if you’re using assistance).
Final Thoughts: Should You Do Pull-Ups?
If you care about:
Strength
Muscle growth
Posture
Shoulder health
Longevity
Athleticism
Real-world physical ability
…then yes - pull-ups deserve a place in your program.
They’re one of the highest-value movements you can do, and they scale to any level of strength.
If you want personalised help with building your pull-up strength and you’re in York or you’d like to train online whether that’s getting your first rep, or pushing weighted pull-ups - I’d love to coach you through it. Below I’ve put together a few clients who went from 0 pull ups to pulling reps after training with me for a few blocks.
