14 Best Hamstrings Exercises

Training your hamstrings with a variety of equipment options allows you to target these crucial posterior chain muscles from multiple angles and resistance profiles. The hamstrings play a vital role in knee flexion, hip extension, and deceleration during movement, making them essential for athletic performance, injury prevention, and balanced lower body development. Whether you're using machines, barbells, dumbbells, or just your bodyweight, each tool offers unique loading patterns that challenge the hamstrings through different ranges of motion and contraction types.

Access to any equipment means you can progress systematically from isolation movements like leg curls to compound patterns like deadlifts, ensuring comprehensive hamstring development. This versatility enables you to address both the knee flexion and hip extension functions of the hamstrings, creating a complete training stimulus that builds strength, size, and resilience. The following 14 exercises represent the most effective movements for hamstring development, each with specific technical cues to maximize your results.

Leg curl

This foundational isolation exercise targets the hamstrings through pure knee flexion, making it ideal for building muscle and establishing a strong mind-muscle connection. The machine-based setup provides constant tension throughout the movement while minimizing involvement from other muscle groups.

Instructions

1. Lie on the leg curl machine, placing the roller pad just above your heels. Grab the handles for support.

2. Curl your legs up toward your glutes, squeezing your hamstrings.

3. Slowly lower the weight with control back to the starting position.

Deadlift

Often called the king of posterior chain exercises, this compound movement simultaneously develops the glutes, hamstrings, and lower back through a powerful hip hinge pattern. The deadlift builds total body strength and teaches proper lifting mechanics that transfer to countless real-world activities.

Instructions

1. Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, with the barbell over the middle of your feet. Hinge at your hips and bend your knees to grip the bar just outside your legs.

2. Keep your back straight, chest up, and look forward.

3. Take a deep breath to brace your core. Initiate the lift by driving through your heels and pushing the floor away.

4. Drive your hips forward and stand tall, squeezing your glutes at the top.

5. Lower the bar with control by pushing your hips back and bending your knees, returning it to the floor.

Nordic curl

Bodyweight training reaches its peak difficulty with this advanced eccentric-focused movement that places extreme tension on the hamstrings. Few exercises match the Nordic curl's ability to build hamstring strength and resilience against injury.

Instructions

1. Kneel on a padded mat and anchor your heels securely under a stable object or have a partner hold them down.

2. Start in an upright position, creating a straight line from your knees to your head.

3. Keeping your body straight and hips extended, slowly lower your torso toward the floor, using your hamstrings to control the entire descent.

4. Use only your hamstrings to powerfully pull your body back to the upright starting position to complete the repetition.

Devil press

This full-body conditioning movement combines a burpee with an overhead swing, creating a metabolically demanding exercise that engages the chest, front delts, glutes, and hamstrings. The explosive hip drive required makes it an excellent choice for building power while elevating your heart rate.

Instructions

1. Place two dumbbells on the floor in front of you. Stand with your feet about shoulder-width apart.

2. Bend down, place your hands on the dumbbells, and kick your feet back to perform a burpee, lowering your chest to the floor.

3. Push back up and jump your feet forward so they land wide, on the outside of the dumbbells. Keep your hips low and back flat.

4. From this low squat position, swing the dumbbells back between your legs.

5. Explosively drive your hips forward and use that momentum to snatch or swing the dumbbells directly overhead until your arms are fully locked out. Lower the weights back to the floor with control to complete one rep.

Deadlift row

By combining explosive pulling from the floor with an upper back row, this hybrid movement trains the glutes, hamstrings, lats, and upper back in a single coordinated effort. The momentum-based technique develops power while teaching your body to transfer force efficiently through the posterior chain.

Instructions

1. Approach the barbell as you would for a conventional deadlift, lining up with your feet hip-width apart and mid-foot under the bar. Grip the bar with a double overhand grip, using straps if needed for heavier weights.

2. Perform an explosive deadlift, lifting the bar as fast as possible to around knee height.

3. As the bar passes your knees, use the momentum and your upper body to aggressively pull the weight up, finishing the row movement. Intensely think about a slight pause at the top.

4. Control the lowering phase, fighting the weight on the way down; do not let the bar flop back to the floor. This completes one repetition.

Good-morning

Named for its resemblance to a formal bow, this hip hinge exercise places significant emphasis on the glutes, hamstrings, and lower back through a controlled forward lean. The movement pattern strengthens the posterior chain while improving hip mobility and spinal stability under load.

Instructions

1. Place a barbell across your upper back and stand with your feet about shoulder-width apart.

2. Keep a slight bend in your knees and push your hips back to lower your torso until it is nearly parallel to the floor.

3. Drive your hips forward to return to the starting position.

Sumo deadlift

The wide stance variation shifts emphasis toward the glutes, hamstrings, and quadriceps while reducing stress on the lower back compared to conventional deadlifts. This stance allows many lifters to maintain a more upright torso position and often accommodates greater loading potential.

Instructions

1. Stand with a very wide stance and grip the bar with your hands inside your knees, feet much wider than shoulder-width apart.

2. Drop your hips, keep your chest up, and maintain a flat back to prepare for the lift.

3. Drive through your heels to lift the bar, keeping it as close to your shins as possible.

4. Stand up completely straight and pull your shoulders back at the top of the movement.

5. Lower the bar by pushing your hips back and bending your knees, resisting the weight on the way down.

Dumbbell swing

This ballistic hip hinge movement develops explosive power in the glutes and hamstrings through rapid acceleration and deceleration cycles. The swing teaches proper hip drive mechanics while building conditioning and posterior chain endurance.

Instructions

1. Stand with your feet slightly wider than shoulder-width. Hold a dumbbell vertically with both hands in front of you.

2. Keeping your back flat, hinge at your hips to send your butt backward and swing the dumbbell high between your legs.

3. Explosively drive your hips forward and squeeze your glutes, using that power to swing the dumbbell up to chest level. The movement should come from your hips, not your arms.

4. Allow the dumbbell's momentum to bring it back down. As it descends, hinge at your hips again to absorb the force and fluidly move into the next repetition.

Glute-ham raise

Purpose-built equipment makes this exercise one of the most effective tools for targeting both the glutes and hamstrings through their full range of motion. The movement challenges both the hip extension and knee flexion functions simultaneously, creating a comprehensive posterior chain stimulus.

Instructions

1. Place your legs between the ankle pads and your knees on the large pad, starting with your torso in an upright position.

2. Slowly lower your torso forward by straightening your knees, keeping your body in a straight line from head to knees.

3. Pull and raise yourself back up to the starting position by engaging your hamstrings and glutes without bending at the waist.

Seated leg curl

Machine-based isolation reaches peak effectiveness with this variation that locks your hips in place, forcing the hamstrings to work through knee flexion alone. The seated position often allows for a greater stretch at the top and stronger contraction at the bottom compared to lying variations.

Instructions

1. Adjust the ankle pads to sit just above your heels and grip the handles firmly.

2. Curl the weight downward as far as possible, squeezing your hamstrings at the bottom.

3. Slowly return to the starting position with control, maintaining tension on the muscle.

Romanian deadlift

This partial-range deadlift variation maintains constant tension on the glutes and hamstrings by keeping the knees slightly bent throughout the movement. The RDL emphasizes the eccentric lengthening phase, making it exceptional for building muscle and improving hip hinge mechanics.

Instructions

1. Stand holding a barbell with an overhand grip, feet shoulder-width apart. Keep a slight bend in your knees.

2. Push your hips back to lower the barbell down the front of your legs, keeping your back straight.

3. Lower the bar until you feel a stretch in your hamstrings (usually just below the knees).

4. Drive your hips forward to pull yourself back up to the starting position.

Cable pull-through

Cable resistance provides smooth, continuous tension throughout this hip hinge movement that targets the glutes and hamstrings. The setup naturally encourages proper form while the rope handle allows for a comfortable grip during high-repetition training.

Instructions

1. Attach a rope handle to the low pulley of a cable machine. Face away from the machine, straddle the cable, and grab the rope between your legs with both hands.

2. Take a few steps forward to create tension. Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and your knees slightly bent.

3. Initiate the movement by pushing your hips backward, keeping your back straight until you feel a stretch in your hamstrings.

4. Powerfully drive your hips forward and squeeze your glutes to return to a tall, standing position.

Stiff-legged deadlift

By minimizing knee bend even further than the Romanian deadlift, this variation places maximum stretch and tension on the glutes and hamstrings. The increased range of motion demands excellent hamstring flexibility while delivering a powerful muscle-building stimulus.

Instructions

1. Stand holding a barbell with an overhand grip, feet shoulder-width apart. Keep your legs nearly straight with only a very slight bend.

2. Push your hips back to lower the barbell toward the floor, keeping your back straight and the bar close to your shins.

3. Lower the bar as far as your flexibility allows (ideally to the floor) while maintaining stiff legs throughout.

4. Drive your hips forward to pull and raise yourself back up to the starting position.

Dumbbell romanian deadlift

Dumbbells offer a user-friendly entry point into Romanian deadlift variations while providing a natural hand position and independent loading for each side. This version allows for easy adjustments in stance and grip while maintaining all the hamstring-building benefits of the barbell variation.

Instructions

1. Stand with your feet hip-width apart, holding the dumbbells in front of your thighs with your chest up.

2. Push your hips back as far as possible to lower the weights, keeping the dumbbells touching your legs and your back flat.

3. Stop when you feel a deep stretch in your hamstrings, then drive your hips forward to stand back up.

Summary

Effective hamstring training requires a balanced approach that includes both isolation exercises for direct muscle stimulation and compound movements for functional strength and power development. Focus on mastering the hip hinge pattern through deadlift variations while incorporating leg curls to address the knee flexion function, ensuring complete hamstring development. Having access to any equipment gives you the flexibility to train your hamstrings effectively regardless of your training environment, whether that means using machines for targeted isolation work or relying on barbells and bodyweight for compound strength builders. Track these exercises and your progressive sets in the FIREFUL app to maintain consistency, monitor your strength gains, and ensure you're building the powerful, resilient hamstrings you're working toward.