Why do you work out? Some guys train with performance in mind, with high standards for hobbies like sports or real-world objectives like enhancing their quality of life. Others are all about aesthetics, hoping to build their self-esteem, fit into the profile of a particular social group, and attract the attention of potential partners by sculpting their body to look a certain way. For those who train for looks, building big time arm muscle is one of the most common goals in the gym—but no matter your goals or objective, your arm muscles should be an essential focus at some point in your workout split.

It's easy to understand why guys are fixated on arm-day training. Well-muscled arms are often seen as a type of status marker. Think about it: if a guy strides into the room with biceps bulging out of his shirtsleeves, he'll probably turn a few heads, and everyone who sees him knows that those big guns probably aren't just a genetic blessing.

Sure, your legs might have bigger muscles and serve a more important role for healthy movement and performance—but it's much easier to show off the hard work you've put in at the gym with one flex of your biceps.

Benefits of Training Your Arm Muscles

That said, there's more to training your arms than just ego and looks. Your arm muscles—namely the biceps, triceps, and forearms—are essential for so many daily movements, from gym staples like pushing, pulling, and pressing to everyday tasks like hauling your groceries or picking your kids up to carry them.

You'll have a better quality of life with strong, healthy arms. What's more, you'll need those muscles to be successful for just about every other type of exercise you'll take on in the gym to help secure the load, even lower body-focused movements like deadlifts and squats.

Training your arm muscles isn't super complicated, especially since there's a wide wealth of movements that are easily accessible for all types of exercisers. You can target your biceps, the crown jewel of the arm muscles, or the triceps, the largest arm muscle on the backside of the limb—or you can really dial down for focused training on less-commonly appreciated muscles like the forearms. No matter which group you want to train, keeping good form paramount will be the most sure path to your gains.

These arm exercises will help you to build up all of those muscles. Make sure to take note of all the notes on form and how to implement them into your training, then plug them into your workout to start on your path to big arms.

The basic, tried-and-true biceps curl is the key to big biceps.

To do it right, squeeze your shoulder blades, glutes and abs. Keep everything tight. Keep your uppers arms perpendicular to the ground, locking in your lats. Take out any rock/momentum from your waist. Keep it all in your biceps.

As you curl up, squeeze your biceps and turn the dumbbell toward the sky (parallel to the ground). The more rotation, the more you're working your bicep. Want an even tougher challenge? Add an isometric hold to the rep at its halfway point. Count a 2 to 5 second hold.

The spiderman curl eliminates all momentum to really target your biceps.

Start on a bench with a 45-degree angle. Your body should be strong and sturdy on your stomach, with your chest high on the bench. Squeeze your glutes to keep pressure off your lower back. Squeeze your shoulder blades, keeping your chest up.

Keep your upper arm angle perpendicular to the ground the whole time. As you curl up, rotate your pinky up. Squeeze your bicep at the top with a forward rotation to keep your shoulder protected.

Dumbbell preacher curls are useful for changing the upper arm angle on your biceps curls, giving the muscles a different type of pump. The EZ bar and specialized bench or machine setup might be more common in big box gyms, but you can do preacher curls anywhere with dumbbells and an adjustable bench.

Set up from behind the bench, laying the back of your arm against its inclined surface and "hugging" your armpit to the top. Squat down and engage your glutes, hamstrings, and abs. Then, curl the weight up, making sure to keep your upper arm glued to the bench and keeping the wrist in a neutral position. Keep the range of motion away from resting at the bottom or top of the movement so it's a position of constant tension.

Concentration curls are a classic biceps builder—and unsurprisingly, most people go about them the wrong way. The most common mistake trainees make with concentration curls is sitting with poor posture. The point is to isolate your biceps muscle, which is difficult if you're moving your torso and digging your elbow into your thigh.

Instead, take your non-working hand off your thigh and hold it away from your body. Sit with good posture (core and shoulders engaged), rest your working arm's triceps against your thigh, and hold the weight. Curl up by only moving at the elbow.

One of the most useful things about arm training is that you can shift your position to shift up the challenge. By performing dumbbell biceps curls from a tall-kneeling position, you won't just eliminate the inclination to "cheat" the curl using body English—you'll get a core workout, too.

Make sure that when you assume the kneeling position, you squeeze your glutes and core.

Shift the traditional biceps curl to holding the weights with a neutral grip for the hammer curl. By making that small change, you'll target a different muscle just beneath the biceps—the brachialis—that will really make your arms pop.

When you proceed through each rep, make sure that you move only at the elbow (just like other curls). If you want to take cheating off the table, you can try the tall-kneeling position.

Add a bench to your curl session to emphasize the peaks of your biceps. The dumbbell incline curl allows you to get into a new position, allowing your to stretch the muscle even more.

Set an incline bench to around a 60 degree angle, and sit back holding a pair of dumbbells. Allow your arms to hang down (but be careful that your shoulders aren't overstretched), with your elbows behind your torso. Curl the weight up moving only at the elbow and squeeze your biceps at the top of the movement, then control the weight down, coming to a pause before starting the next rep.

The crucifix curl gives you a chance to change up your angle and really isolate your biceps muscle. You'll need a cable tower or a resistance band to do it.

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To keep your biceps isolated for the biggest possible pump, try it from a tall kneeling position. Imagine there's a wall in front of you that you're not allowed to touch—then squeeze your muscle to build it up.

While the chinup might be chiefly known as a back-builder, you can sculpt massive arms using the bodyweight exercise, too.

To make the move even more arm-centric, try to extend the time under tension by slowly emphasizing the eccentric (descending) portion of the exercise.

This challenging exercise (okay, it's pretty much a workout) mashes up two sure-fire ways to build muscle—the classic 21s workout protocol, and a shifting load position by changing the ways you work with the weight.

You'll combine a drag curl, a standard curl, and a preacher-esque variation to switch up your stimulus. That, plus the high-volume nature of 21s, will lead to more muscle growth.

You've used all types of resistance—add a band to that list for a truly diverse arm pump. You'll shift your arms away from your torso, which is great to get you out of your comfort zone.

Loop the band around your feet to get into position here. Squeeze your biceps at the top of each rep to make the most out of the movement.

The skull crusher will help pack muscle to your triceps.

With a bar, isolate that skull crusher motion without any aid from momentum. Keep your feet flat on the floor. Lie back on the bench and squeeze your glutes as hard as you can. This is your strong base. Don't let your ribcage flare. Keep your abs tight. Drive your shoulder blades into the bench. Lower the weight and squeeze your triceps to create tension. Keep your wrists strong and maintain a 90 to 92 degree angle an inch from your head. Keep your elbows tight and in, squeezing your triceps at the top for 1 second.

The pushup is the perfect bodyweight move that gets your arms involved.

Start in a pushup position with your glutes and abs squeezed. Your hands should be directly under your shoulders with your hands screwed in with some external rotation. Look down at the ground. Engage your midback and squeeze your shoulder blades. Lower down, keeping your elbows close to the torso. Push all the way up. If you need to modify, use a bench.

The close-grip pushup targets your triceps—and is a much safer option than a diamond pushup, which can allow for potentially dangerous internal rotation at the shoulder.

Squeeze through your glutes and core as you get in position. Look straight toward the ground. Get your hands narrower than shoulder width, with your hands facing forward. Turn your lats on by turning your elbows forward. Lower as you would with a pushup, keeping your elbows as tight to your torso as possible. Keep your forearms as close to perpendicular tot he ground as possible.

3 to 4 sets of 10 to 12 reps

The triceps pressdown is a muscle-building staple that remains a go-to for guys with access to cable machines (you can also use resistance bands tethered to a high anchor point).

For the standard variation of the exercise, stand in front of the cable stack gripping the handles of the rope tightly, keeping your core engaged and you glutes squeezed to stand tall. From there, press downward, moving only at the elbow joint.

MH fitness director Ebenezer Samuel, C.S.C.S. has a quick hack to avoid cheating your posture—plant your back against an incline bench to keep your torso in a strict position. Just make sure to keep tension in your glutes, core, and shoulders.

The triceps kickback is a go-to muscle-builder—but you have to be intentional in your movements. One big key to getting the most out of the exercise is working with lighter weights.

Once you've set up with your arm using a bench for support, make sure that you hold the weight with your upper arm parallel to the ground. Then, extend your arm, only moving at the elbow. If you can't control the movement, drop down to a lighter weight.

The JM press combines one killer triceps move, the skull crusher, with another, the close-grip press. The result is a muscle and strength building hybrid you'll want to have in your workout.

Keep this cue in mind once you hit the bench: Points of dumbbells touch your shoulders, elbows touch your ribs. Move deliberately to pile on the time under tension, then reap the benefits.

Bench dips might not be the best option for you if you have a history of shoulder issues—but you can build strength without a ton of gear using the exercise in a pinch.

Avoid the major mistake most people make when they do dips. Instead of placing your hands on the bench surface so that they pointed forward at your back, point them outward by laying your hands out with your fingers facing away from you.

We've already highlighted the benefits of the bodyweight classic in all of its forms. You can supercharge muscle growth by adding a load, taking it into a different realm entirely.

Getting that load on is tricky. Once you have it in place, use the plate as a check to keep your core and glutes engaged so it doesn't slide off as you work.

The farmer's carry boils down to carrying a heavy load while walking that builds muscle in the back, forearms and core.

To set up, mimic a deadlift. Tighten your core and stand up with your weights. Grip your weights aggressively. Keep the weights level. Squeeze your glutes and keep your pelvis neutral. Squeeze your abs and draw your ribcage in. Roll your shoulders back to turn on your lower lats and rhomboids. Keep your neck in a neutral position as you walk straight ahead.

The towel hammer curl works your brachialis muscle, just like the dumbbell version—but adding the towel gives you an extra grip challenge, which helps to blow up your forearms.

Wrap your towel around the handle of a kettlebell, then grip either end of the fabric as tightly as you can. From there, perform hammer curls using solid form, making sure to keep your core engaged and movements fluid to accommodate the hanging weight.

The Zottman curl is another biceps move that gets your forearms involved—but this exercise completely shifts the focus halfway through. This isn't a big weight movement, so make sure to focus on form and control even more than with your other curls.

Start holding the dumbbells in your hands with the weights at your sides, just like a standard curl. Move only at the elbow to curl the weight up, pausing at the top to squeeze your biceps. Twist your wrists so that your palms face forward. Lower down slowly, controlling the weight through the eccentric portion of the lift.

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