How Many Sets and Reps Should You Do? Strength, Hypertrophy & Endurance

When it comes to sets and reps, there are some pretty established conventions in the fitness industry.

They aren't absolute rules.

But there are certain rep ranges that most lifters are going to come across sooner or later, normally depending on whether the main goal is strength, muscle growth or muscular endurance.

Over the years, I've trained with pretty much all of them.

I've done singles.

Doubles.

Triples.

I've spent long periods doing 5×5.

I've used the classic 8–12 rep bodybuilding range, and I've pushed sets into the 15–20 rep range and well beyond it.

And then there was probably the stupidest version.

The Three-Minute Squat Set

I'll tell you about this for full disclosure.

It is not something I'm recommending you copy.

I once put 60 kg on the bar for squats and gave myself one objective:

Do as many reps as possible in three minutes. Continuously.

Now let me tell you something.

Once you get past 20 squats and keep going, the burn through your quads is unreal.

Your breathing goes.

Your legs are screaming.

And every extra rep suddenly makes 60 kg feel considerably heavier than it did when you started.

At the time, I genuinely thought:

This is going to give me massive quads.

Would it create a training stimulus?

Of course.

Was there a safer, more controlled and probably much more sensible way of building my legs?

Absolutely.

That's one thing I've realised from sitting down and actually writing years of my training out for other people to learn from.

I've experimented with nearly everything.

But something feeling brutally hard doesn't automatically make it the best way to train.

So before you start inventing ridiculous challenges for yourself, understand the standards first.

Then you can decide how you want to use them.

Strength Training: The 1–5 Rep Range

If your main goal is getting stronger, the classic strength-focused range is roughly 1–5 reps with a heavy weight.

But there's an important part of that which gets misunderstood.

I don't mean work your way up through a session, hit one heavy single and say:

Done. Strength training completed.

I'm talking about your working sets.

Choose a weight that puts you inside that lower rep range.

Perform the set.

Recover properly.

Then repeat quality work with that weight.

You might get everything absolutely perfect on one heavy single.

You might grind out five reps once.

But repeat strong, controlled work over several sets and suddenly you have something you can actually track and progress.

Higher-load resistance training generally produces greater improvements in maximal strength than lower-load training. The 2026 American College of Sports Medicine position stand also highlights heavier loading — around 80% of one-repetition maximum or above — when strength is the priority. [1] A systematic review comparing low- and high-load resistance training found the same general pattern for strength, while hypertrophy could occur across a broader range of loads. [2]

What I Use Now: 5 Sets of 3

These days, one of my favourite strength approaches is incredibly simple:

5 sets of 3 reps.

I'll pick one working weight and perform:

3 reps × 5 sets.

If I complete all five sets properly and I'm happy with my technique, the goal the following week is simple.

Increase the weight.

Then try to do:

3 reps × 5 sets again.

I like this because progression is obvious.

I'm not constantly changing the target.

The reps remain the same.

The sets remain the same.

The variable I'm trying to progress is the load.

If I can perform five sets of three with one weight and later perform the same five sets of three with more weight, I've got clear evidence that I've progressed.

That's progressive overload in one of its simplest forms.

I've used other systems too. I spent a long period training with 5×5, and that changed the way I thought about strength work completely. You can read more about that in From Bro Split to 5×5: Why I Hated It at First.

If you're interested in how all the different phases fitted together, read How My Training Changed Over the Years — And What Each Style Taught Me.

And if you want to see how years of progressive strength work played out on one lift specifically, I've also broken down how I built a 170 kg bench press over ten years.

Hypertrophy Training: The Classic 8–12 Rep Range

Then we get into muscle building.

Or, if we want the proper term:

Hypertrophy training.

When I was originally taught how to train for muscle growth, I was given the classic range:

8–12 reps.

Personally, I normally aimed for around 10 or 11 reps.

I'd work up to my working weight and continue using it until I could perform my sets to a good standard.

Once that weight started becoming comfortable and I could consistently hit the repetitions I wanted, I'd increase it.

Then the process started again.

Again, that's progressive overload.

What Should a Hypertrophy Set Actually Feel Like?

For normal everyday gym training, 8–12 reps is still a very useful range.

But there's something I think matters more than simply counting to ten.

How hard was the set?

If you perform eight reps and feel like you could comfortably do another fifteen, stopping because somebody wrote “8 reps” on a programme misses the point.

When I'm doing this kind of training, I want the set to start becoming properly difficult towards the end.

Rep eight is getting hard.

Rep nine requires concentration.

Rep ten is harder again.

And if I'm pushing towards eleven or twelve, those final repetitions should require genuine effort.

That's the feeling I'm looking for.

But don't confuse difficult reps with terrible reps.

Hard reps don't have to be ugly reps.

You don't need to destroy your technique.

You don't need somebody dragging the weight off you on every set.

And you don't need to take absolutely everything to complete muscular failure.

Research suggests muscle growth tends to improve as sets are taken closer to failure, although reaching complete failure on every set is not required. [3]

The goal is productive effort.

Not chaos.

Why 8–12 Isn't a Magic Muscle-Building Zone

There's something else worth knowing.

When I was learning to train, 8–12 was often spoken about as though it was the muscle-building range.

We now know it's much less rigid than that.

Research comparing heavier and lighter resistance training has found that muscle growth can occur across a fairly broad range of loads when training is sufficiently challenging. Heavier loads still have an advantage when maximal strength is the goal, but muscle growth itself isn't locked inside eight to twelve reps. [2]

So why do I still like 8–12?

Because it's practical.

The weight is normally heavy enough to feel substantial.

The set isn't so long that your lungs become the limiting factor.

And it's extremely easy to track progression.

For me, aiming around ten or eleven reps always gave me a simple target.

If I was struggling to reach eight with reasonable technique, the weight might be too heavy for what I was trying to achieve.

If I was flying through twelve and clearly had plenty left, it might be time to increase the load.

Somewhere between those two points was normally where I wanted to be.

Use the range as a framework.

Not a prison.

If you're still learning how all the pieces fit together, How to Build Muscle: The Complete Beginner's Guide goes through resistance training, progressive overload, nutrition and recovery together.

Muscular Endurance: Higher Reps

Then we get into muscular endurance.

Once you start moving into higher-repetition sets — commonly around 12–20+ reps in everyday gym programming — the emphasis starts shifting more towards sustaining muscular effort under fatigue.

This is where my ridiculous three-minute squat set from the beginning starts to make slightly more sense.

I wasn't testing how much weight I could squat once.

I was testing how long my legs could continue producing force while fatigue kept building.

And once you're twenty-plus squats deep and still going, you understand muscular endurance very quickly.

Does Endurance Training Have a Place?

Absolutely.

Personally, I just wouldn't make extremely high-repetition training the only thing I ever did unless I had a specific reason for it.

If your sport or activity requires repeated muscular effort, muscular endurance obviously becomes more important.

Likewise, if improving work capacity is part of your goal, higher-repetition work can be useful.

But there's an important point here:

High reps can still build muscle.

Doing fifteen or twenty reps doesn't suddenly switch muscle growth off.

Research comparing lower and higher training loads has found similar hypertrophy outcomes in many circumstances when sets are performed with a sufficiently high level of effort. [2]

The difference is the emphasis.

Very high-repetition sets generally involve lighter loads and demand more local muscular endurance.

Heavy low-repetition sets let you practise producing force against much larger loads.

Neither has to exist completely separately from the other.

What About Slow-Twitch and Fast-Twitch Muscle Fibres?

This is another area where the explanation often gets oversimplified.

Your Type I fibres, commonly called slow-twitch fibres, are generally more resistant to fatigue and suited to repeated muscular work.

Your Type II fibres, or fast-twitch fibres, are generally associated with producing greater force and power.

But don't imagine that one rep range simply switches one fibre type on while another range switches it off.

Your body doesn't work that neatly.

Research comparing low-load and high-load resistance training has not shown a clean rule where one loading style exclusively grows one fibre type and another exclusively grows the other. [4]

If you want the fibre types broken down in more detail, read Muscle Fibre Types Explained: Type I, Type IIa and Type IIx.

So How Many Sets Should You Actually Do?

This is where people often become obsessed with finding one perfect number.

Three sets?

Four?

Five?

Ten?

There isn't one number that fits every exercise, every muscle and every person.

But multiple working sets are a sensible foundation.

The 2026 ACSM position stand highlights around 2–3 sets per exercise with heavier loads when strength is the priority, while hypertrophy tends to benefit from greater total weekly training volume. As a broad reference point, ACSM highlights approximately 10 sets per muscle group per week for muscle growth. [1]

That does not mean everybody needs exactly ten.

And it definitely doesn't mean you need ten sets of one exercise in a single session.

Think about your training volume across the whole week.

For example, chest volume might come from:

• Bench press
• Incline dumbbell press
• Chest press
• Flyes

Those sets all contribute to the work your chest is doing.

A 2026 meta-regression found that increasing weekly set volume was associated with greater gains in both muscle size and strength, but with diminishing returns as volume increased. [5]

That's why I prefer starting with an amount of work you can actually recover from and then adjusting from there.

If you're recovering well, progressing and performing strongly, you've got something to build from.

If you're adding more and more sets while your performance collapses, more volume isn't automatically the answer.

I've written more about that in Why Am I Not Making Progress in the Gym?.

A Simple Sets and Reps Starting Point

Strength

Reps: Roughly 1–5.

Approach: Heavy load, multiple quality working sets and enough rest to reproduce strong performance.

My personal example: 5×3.

Muscle Growth / Hypertrophy

Reps: The classic practical range is 8–12, although muscle can grow across a much wider range.

Approach: Use multiple challenging sets and take them close enough to failure that the final repetitions require real effort while technique remains controlled.

Muscular Endurance

Reps: Often 12–20+.

Approach: Lighter loads, longer continuous muscular effort and greater fatigue resistance.

None of these ranges exists in isolation.

A person training primarily for muscle can still do sets of five.

A strength athlete can still do accessory work for twelve reps.

And someone working on endurance can still benefit from heavier strength work.

You Don't Need to Pick One Rep Range for Life

This is probably the biggest point I want to get across.

I've trained with heavy singles.

Triples.

5×5.

Eight to twelve reps.

Fifteen to twenty reps.

And, for reasons I still don't completely understand, three straight minutes of squats.

Each style taught me something.

These days I don't believe you need to find one magical rep range and stay there forever.

You need to understand why you're using the range you're using.

Want to get better at producing maximum force?

Spend time lifting heavy.

Want to build muscle?

Accumulate enough challenging resistance-training volume and gradually progress it.

Want better muscular endurance?

Include higher-repetition work.

Want a mixture?

Then use a mixture.

That's one reason training programmes can look completely different and still produce results.

The programme needs to match the goal.

And if you're wondering how often that work should actually be spread across the week, read How Many Days a Week Should You Train to Build Muscle?.

Learn the standards first.

Understand what each rep range is trying to achieve.

Track what you're doing.

Then make the programme your own.

Because the number written next to an exercise isn't what makes you progress.

What you do with it is.

References

1. Currier BS et al. American College of Sports Medicine Position Stand: Resistance Training Prescription for Muscle Function, Hypertrophy, and Physical Performance in Healthy Adults. 2026.
2. Schoenfeld BJ et al. Strength and Hypertrophy Adaptations Between Low- vs. High-Load Resistance Training: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. 2017.
3. Robinson ZP et al. Exploring the Dose-Response Relationship Between Estimated Resistance Training Proximity to Failure, Strength Gain, and Muscle Hypertrophy. 2024.
4. Grgic J. The Effects of Low-Load vs. High-Load Resistance Training on Muscle Fiber Hypertrophy: A Meta-Analysis. 2020.
5. Pelland JC et al. The Resistance Training Dose Response: Meta-Regressions Exploring the Effects of Weekly Volume and Frequency on Muscle Hypertrophy and Strength Gains. 2026.

This article is general training information based on personal experience and published research. Adjust training to your ability and seek appropriate professional advice if you have an injury, medical condition or concerns about exercise.