When you want to gain some muscle mass doing home workouts, you might have a few questions like – is it possible to gain muscle at home or can home workouts help you with building muscle etc.
If you workout at home and follow the right measures and a diet plan then yes, you can gain muscle at home.
Read on if you want to know in detail about gaining muscle from doing home workouts.
In this blog post, you will read – can you actually add some muscle mass without going to a gym? And what steps should you take to get the best results in terms of muscle building from your home workouts?
Can you gain muscle at home?
Yes, you can gain muscle at home but for gaining muscle at home, you have to properly optimise your workouts and follow a diet plan that is good for muscle building.
Although you can gain muscle at home but you should not expect to see big results – in terms of muscle gain when you are exercising from home. From home workouts, you can expect to see moderate amounts of muscle gain.
Exercising at the gym is indeed best for building muscle. Because at the gym you get to use many types of equipment and have a wide range of weights that you can lift to build muscle.
So, if you want to build a serious amount of muscle mass then from the start you should workout at the gym.
But if you can be happy with moderate amounts of muscle gain and have a toned body, then you don’t need all those gym equipment. You just need to optimise your home workout and diet plan to build muscle at home.
If you follow the right workout plan and eating habits, then you can see good results in terms of bulking and adding muscle mass to your body from home workouts.
In the below sections of this article, I will give you more tips on how to gain muscle at home.
How long does it take to build muscle at home?
Whether you are exercising at the gym or at home, the time it will take to build muscle stays the same. Speaking of gym workouts – if you lift heavy weights, you can expect to see visible results in your body within 4 weeks. Building muscle naturally does take time.
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You should expect to see good muscle-building results from your home workouts within 6-7 weeks. The amount of muscle gain can vary from person to person as they are following different training methods.
You should wait at least 45 days after you have followed a muscle-building workout plan before you make any changes to your workout schedule.
For muscle building at home, you need to workout for 3-4 days per week to see better muscle-building results.
Related: How many pushups should you do in a day to build muscle.
What should I eat to gain muscle at home?
When you are training to gain muscle from your home workouts, you should follow a safe diet to avoid any other health issues while you are bulking up and gaining muscle mass.
For gaining muscle mass from your home workouts, you should follow a balanced diet and try to eat more protein. Because when you are trying to build muscle – eating adequate amounts of protein will give you the best results in terms of muscle building.
From a caloric point of view, to add muscle mass to your body you should consume 200-500 more calories on top of what you normally eat. And it will be great if those extra calories come from protein sources.
So, when you want to gain muscle, you don’t need to make a lot of changes to your diet. You can eat what you normally eat just add some food that will add 200-500 additional calories to your diet.
It would be best if those additional calories mainly consist of protein. Also if you want to bulk up and gain muscle mass then you should have – healthy amounts of carbs as well.
Just remember to eat healthily. And in your muscle-gaining diet, you shouldn’t include any fast food and try to eat fewer fried food items. Fast food doesn’t help in muscle building and consuming junk food is actually unhealthy for your body.
To gain muscle mass at home, you should include these food items in your diet:
- For protein: meat, fatty fish like salmon, eggs, dairy products, peanut butter, cottage cheese, beans, soya chunks, chickpeas, black lentils, split peas, green gram, almonds etc.
- For carbs: Bread, potatoes, rice, pasta, vegetables, whole fruits, almonds, walnuts, peanuts etc.
Can you build muscle at home without equipment?
Yes, you can workout at home and gain muscle without equipment. To gain muscle at home with bodyweight exercises, you have to focus on your diet and exercise 3-4 days per week. But remember you will gain moderate amounts of muscle from doing bodyweight exercises at home.
It’s because after 30-40 days of bodyweight training at home – you will gain some muscle mass. But after that initial muscle gains, your body begins to get used to bodyweight exercises.
So after that initial gain, you will still gain muscle if you follow your diet and exercise for 3-4 days. But you will gain muscle at a slower pace after your initial muscle gain.
To make sure you gain muscle from your home workouts – you have to change your workout plan after every 45 days.
Always you have to make your workouts challenging for your body. And you have to perform most of the bodyweight exercises like pushups until failure.
In the below section, you will read more about how to workout at home without any equipment so that you gain muscle mass.
How to gain muscle at home without any equipment
Gaining muscle at home becomes easier – if you incorporate some weight training. However, you can still gain muscle mass at home by doing bodyweight exercises. But you have to modify your bodyweight training in order to gain muscle mass at home without lifting weights.
The first rule to build muscle at home without any equipment is to workout for 3-4 days per week. And you should workout for 30-45 minutes in each session.
If you want to build muscle at home, then in your workout, you have to give equal importance to the upper body and lower body workouts.
Also, for an exercise, let’s say pushups – you have to do multiple variations of it. So that when you workout – you hit different muscle groups. To build muscle, along with normal pushups – you have to do other pushup variations like – diamond pushups, wide grip pushups, incline pushups, decline pushups, pike pushups etc.
To make your workouts challenging for your body, you have to always push your limits.
It’s important if you want to gain muscle mass by only doing bodyweight exercises. When you are exercising, you have to follow a few rules if you want to build muscle:
- Do multiple variations of one exercise.
- Do a high number of repetitions or workout till failure.
- Do drop sets (To do a drop set – first you have to do an exercise until failure then take rest for a short time, 10-20 seconds then again do that exercise until you hit a breakout point. Drop sets are done to feel the tension in your muscle groups and effective for muscle building and gaining strength).
- Do your workouts in such a way that your last 3-4 repetitions of every exercise become challenging to do but it should not be that much challenging that you are not unable to do that exercise with proper form.
What equipment you should use to build muscle at home
When you give yourself the option to include some weight training in your home workout, then it gets easier to build muscle at home. Also, adding some weight training along with bodyweight exercises means you will get better results in terms of muscle building.
To do weight training at home, you don’t need much equipment at all.
For both men and women, having 2 pairs of dumbbells at home is all you need to get started with weight training at home.
For the 2 pairs of dumbbells, you need to have a pair of light to medium weight dumbbells for working out your upper body. And for training your lower body, you should get a heavier dumbbell set. This one you should use while doing squats or deadlifts.
Adding dumbbells to your workout can give you impressive results when it comes to muscle building.
For men and those who would like to have a few other pieces of equipment at home other than 2 pairs of dumbbells, you can get a kettlebell of weight around 40-50 pounds.
Additionally, for men, if you want to add a good amount of muscle mass and want to do a few gym workouts at home and want to lift more than 50 pounds, then you can get a barbell and some free weights.
Exercising with these items can give you better muscle-building results in comparison to just doing bodyweight exercises.
Can I build muscle at home with dumbbells?
For most people having 2 pairs of dumbbells will be more than enough to start training for muscle building. Yes, you can build muscle at home with dumbbells.
For weight training at home, dumbbells are great. You can use them for upper body and lower body training. Thus getting those can help you to make your workouts more challenging.
In the below section, you will read more about the exercises you can do with dumbbells to gain muscle at home.
Can you build muscle fast at home?
Muscle building isn’t an overnight process. It takes time to build lean muscle mass. Also, after building muscle – even if you don’t workout for some days or weeks you will not lose most of your muscle gains.
The fact is – it takes time to build muscle and also it stays for long.
Even Though you can’t build muscle overnight, you can do a few things to speed up the muscle-building process and build muscle fast at home.
To build muscle fast at home – first, you should focus on your diet and increase the amount of easy-to-digest protein you eat. For building muscle, eating an adequate amount of protein is necessary.
As you are training from home and will do bodyweight exercises and a few weight training with dumbbells for the most part, you don’t need to consume the same amount of protein bodybuilders take.
Try to eat what you usually eat and add 40-60 grams of protein to your diet. Or you can add additional 200-500 calories from protein sources on top of your regular meal to build muscle at home.
Also, your need to remember one thing – avoid eating a lot of protein all at once or don’t eat protein in large quantities for one day and then ignore other days.
Pick the amount of protein you are comfortable with and try to maintain that for most days of the week. Doing this will help you to speed up the process of muscle building at home.
The second rule to build muscle fast at home is to workout for at least 3 days a week and workout for 30-45 minutes.
On your workout days for most of the exercises do 3-4 sets. And if you are doing pushups to build muscle – you should do different pushup types and in each set do pushups until failure.
If you follow the above two rules, then you can speed up your muscle-building process and get good results.
Exercises you can do at home to gain muscle
To gain muscle from working out at home it’s important to train hard and also do the right exercises that will help you in the muscle-building process.
Here are the exercises you can do at home to gain muscle. This list is divided into two parts. The first part is for bodyweight training and the second part is for weight training.
Bodyweight exercises to gain muscle
In this list, you will find what type of bodyweight exercises you need to do at home in order to gain muscle mass.
| Exercise | Total sets and reps |
| Pushups (+ pushup variations) | 3-4 sets until failure |
| Body weight squats | 30-50 per set a total of 3 sets |
| Jump squats | 20 per set a total of 3-4 sets |
| Burpees | 10-20 per set a total of 2-3 sets |
| Tricep dips | 10-15 per set a total of 2-3 sets |
| Walking lunges | 15-20 per set a total of 2-3 sets |
| Split squats | 10-15 per set a total of 2-3 sets |
| Lunge jumps | 10-15 per set a total of 2 sets |
Weight training exercises to gain muscle
In this list, you will find what type of weight training exercises you need to do at home in order to add muscle mass to your body.
| Exercise | Total sets and reps |
|---|---|
| Dumbbell bent over row | 10-15 per set a total of 3 sets |
| Squats with dumbbells | 10-20 per set a total of 3 sets |
| Deadlifts with dumbbells | 10-15 per set a total of 2-3 sets |
| Bicep curls with dumbbells | 12-15 per set a total of 3 sets |
| Tricep extension with dumbbells | 10-15 per set 2-3 sets |
| Lunges with dumbbells | 10-15 per set 2-3 sets |
| Dumbbell bench press | 10-20 per set 3-4 sets |
| Dumbbell shoulder press | 12-15 per set 3 sets |
| Dumbbell row | 10-15 per set 2-3 sets |
FAQs about gaining muscle at home
Is it possible to build muscle without weights?
Yes, it’s possible to build muscle without weights by doing bodyweight exercises at home. However, you can’t expect big muscle gains without lifting weights. To gain muscle from bodyweight training you have to do multiple sets of different exercises to build muscle at home.
What equipment do I need to build muscle at home?
The best equipment you can use to build muscle at home is two pairs of dumbbells. With dumbbells, you can train your upper body and lower body at home. Including dumbbells in your home workout will make your workouts more intense and you can see better results in terms of muscle gain.
What type of muscle-building results can I expect from home workouts?
If you do weight training along with bodyweight exercises at home, you can expect to see good results from your home workouts. You can gain a good amount of lean muscle within 45-70 days.
What’s the best diet tips to gain muscle at home
The best diet tip to gain muscle at home is to eat 200-500 more calories than what you normally eat. And eat those extra calories from protein sources. Also, you should eat adequate amounts of carbs to provide your body with – ample amounts of energy that you will use during the day.
How can I build muscle without going to the gym?
To build muscle it’s not mandatory to go to the gym. With proper training and diet in place, you can also build muscle at home. Include some dumbbell workouts in your home workout session and you will see good results in terms of muscle building.
Can push-ups build muscle?
Yes, pushups can help you to build your upper body and gain muscle mass. To use pushups for muscle building, you have to do different types of pushups and do pushups until failure and do 3-4 sets of pushups in one session. You can do – normal pushups, diamond pushups, wide grip pushups, decline pushups, incline pushups and pike pushups.
How can I bulk up fast at home?
To bulk up fast at home – first, you have to follow a diet where you eat adequate amounts of protein and carbs. Then in your workout add compound exercises like squats, deadlifts, bench presses and resistance exercises. To bulk up fast you can also do HIIT and full body workouts.
How can I build muscle naturally?
To build muscle naturally without any supplements you have to eat good amounts of protein and carbs. In a day you should eat 50-80 grams of protein from your meals.
Then do bodyweight exercises and weight training. To build muscle naturally you should workout 3-4 days a week and workout for 30-45 minutes.
How can a skinny person bulk up?
If you are a skinny person and want to bulk up then first you need to workout. While you are working out you need to pick 6-7 exercises for a workout session and do 3-4 sets of those exercises and you should do 10-15 repetitions in each set.
Along with exercise, you need to eat more calories. Try to increase your calories from 50-100 calories per day and maintain it throughout the week and from next week add additional 50 calories and every week increase it by 50 calories.
In your meals – eat adequate amounts of protein and curb. Also, you can eat 4-5 smaller meals throughout the day to bulk up fast.
Can you get big from home workouts?
You can get moderate amounts of muscle mass from home workouts. If you add weight training to your home workouts then you can get big from home workouts. However, you can’t get huge from home workouts.
Conclusion: Muscle building and home workouts
Can you gain muscle at home? Yes, you can gain muscle at home. To gain muscle you have to follow a balanced diet or you can also follow your regular diet. Just add 200-500 calories on top of your normal diet and get most of the extra calories from protein sources.
After eating the right food you should try to workout for at least 3 days a week. The muscle-building result you get at home also depends on how you are exercising at home.
To build your upper body – do multiple variations of pushups and train until failure. To add muscle mass it’s important that after every 45 days you change your workout plan and always make your workouts challenging for your body.
You can gain muscle mass at home by doing bodyweight exercises at home without using any equipment. But then you have to keep your expectations low.
For better muscle-building results, add some exercises with dumbbells. Adding some weight training to your workout routine can have a big impact in terms of how much muscle you will gain.
Also, you can speed up the process and gain muscle fast at home if you eat adequate amounts of protein, carbs and train hard.
If you follow the tips you have read in this post, then you can gain muscle at home and for gaining muscle mass it’s not necessary to go to the gym.
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