How to Do Glute Step-Ups in The Gym

As someone embarking on a glute growth journey, you may or may not be familiar with glute step-ups.

Glute step-ups an excellent, yet unique glute exercise that work your glutes in a way that not many exercises do.

Regardless though, of your current familiarity with the exercise, this post is here to teach you everything you need to know, starting from ground zero, about glute step-ups.

Starting with the fact that I really don’t think this exercise gets the total recognition it deserves, considering the tremendous role it plays in glute growth.

In this post, I want to share how you can master step-ups, add them into your glute routine, and see glute growth and results like you’ve never seen before.

In This Post You’ll Find:

Why Step-Ups Are Such an Overlooked Glute Building Exercise

As effective as they are, I still don’t think there’s enough hype surrounding glute step-ups in anyone’s glute routine.

Which I think is mainly because they’re not talked about enough, and because the form can be difficult to perfect, not many people know how to do them correctly.

Making them seem less effective, and lose popularity and recognition!

Don’t get me wrong, there are tons of great, effective glute growing exercises out there. And these are certainly ones you’d want to add into your glute routine.

However, a lot of these exercises, even though they’re different, work your glute muscles in similar ways.

Leading to similar growth, all throughout your glutes.

But to create well-rounded, bigger glute muscles, you need to find exercises that challenge and stimulate your glutes to grow in new ways.

And glute step-ups are one exercise that do just that!

What Makes Step-Ups Different From Other Glute Exercises

Like I mentioned earlier, glute step-ups target and work your glutes in ways that not a lot of other glute exercises do.

By this I mean differently than the most common, traditional glute exercises do.

But what is it exactly that makes step-ups so unique, and different from other glute exercises?

Well, there are two major reasons for this.

Step-Ups are a Unilateral Glute Exercise

The first major factor that makes glute step-ups so unique is that they’re a unilateral exercise.

Which means that only one half of your body, or in this case, one leg, is working during each set.

Unilateral exercise are some of the most effective, yet underutilized exercises to grow your glutes.

And if you think about it, there aren’t many typical unilateral exercises that make their way into many people’s leg days.

The most common, well-known and talked about glute exercises, things like hip thrusts, squats, and RDLs, are all bilateral exercises.

So if you want to make your glute day stand out from most traditional glute routines, then implementing at least one unilateral exercise into your routine is the way to go.

Letting you know from my experience, doing will tremendously boost you’re glute growth and progress.

Unilateral Exercises Will Transform Your Entire Glute Routine

Implementing unilateral exercises into my glute routine was truly the key to transforming every single one of my glute workouts.

I swear, once I started doing unilateral glute exercises, it was like a whole new realm of progress opened up for me.

To be completely honest here, when I first started in the gym, I spent a long time not knowing much beyond the basics of working out.

I didn’t know that there was such a thing as unilateral and bilateral exercises, much less know the difference between the two.

But eventually I learned about glute step-ups and that they were a unilateral exercise, and decided to try them out.

It wasn’t until then that I experienced first hand the role that unilateral exercises play in your leg growth. It was game changer.

From then on, I never looked back. And I’m willing to bet you won’t either.

Step-Ups Require Your Glute Muscles to Stay Balanced and Stabilized

The second reason glute step-ups so uniquely target your glutes is that they work your glutes beyond just forcing them to push weight.

At this point you know that step-ups are a unilateral exercise and what that means.

But it’s important that I point out that they’re not just any other unilateral exercise.

They’re a unilateral exercise where you’re balancing on one leg and lowering yourself down off the edge of an elevated surface.

As a result, they’re forcing your glutes to push the weight they’re lifting, while also balancing and stabilizing your entire body.

Okay, this might not mean much to you. But it’s actually a really important element of the exercise.

When your glutes need to stabilize your body during an exercise, different glute muscles need to work to keep yourself stabilized.

Different muscles than ones that typically work during all your other glute exercises.

Which I’ll explain more about the role of this in the next section. For now, just make note that this is extremely important for your glute growth.

Top Reasons Why Glute Step-Ups are So Beneficial for Your Glute Growth

If there’s going to be only one second of this post that sticks with you, although I hope there are more, please make it this one.

These are some of the biggest ways that glute step-ups will transform every glute exercise you do.

They aren’t just one exercise that does a really good job at targeting your glutes. You’ll carry their effects with you into every other glute exercise you do from this point forward.

Glute Step-Ups Effectively Target and Grow Your Upper Glutes

I talked about how doing step-ups requires your glutes to stabilize and balance your body during the exercise.

And I mentioned that this was important, but now I want to explain why it’s so important.

To do that, first we need to talk about the glute medius. And why it’s such a difficult glute muscle to grow.

Although you might not be familiar with this, your glutes are made up of three different muscles: The glute maximus, the glute minimus, and the glute medius.

Of these three glute muscles, your glute medius is the smallest of them all.

And in order to effectively target this region, while also avoiding letting your larger glute muscles take over, an exercise needs to work your glutes in a very specific way.

The Two Specific Conditions in Any Exercise That Work Your Upper Glutes:

Your glute medius is one of the major stabilizing muscles in your glutes and hips.

As a result, one of the best conditions to engage this region is any glute exercise that requires you to stabilize and balance your body.

Which will typically be a unilateral exercise, where your non-working leg isn’t providing any support. Sound familiar?

The second condition that produces a significant stretch on your upper, outer glutes is a unilateral exercise where your working leg travels elevated, across the front of your body, while your hips move back and out.

Again, sound familiar?

You might not have noticed yet, but both of these are the exact conditions that step-ups put your glutes through!

Meaning that they’re literally ideal for targeting and growing your upper glutes!

The Importance Of Growing Your Glute Medius

So, when done correctly, step-ups just about perfectly target your glute medius. Which is great, but why is this important?

Well, growing your upper glutes (your glute medius) is absolutely essential to giving you the best shaped glutes.

Since your glute medius is a small muscle, growing it won’t result in a tremendous increase in the actual size of your glutes. But what it will do is create the appearance of larger glutes.

By growing your upper glutes, you’re able to grow the shelf that everyone’s so often striving for.

Which is essentially what creates the appearance of bigger, rounder, more lifted glutes.

Especially from the sides.

So to sum things up, your glute medius is just about the most important glute muscle to improve the appearance and shape of your glutes.

The only other exercises that come remotely close to this motion, that are also effective exercises to grow your upper glutes, are single leg RDL’s and glute cable kickbacks.

Step-Ups Activate Your Glutes (Leading to a Better Mind to Muscle Connection)

If I had to give one exercise credit for my glute growth this far, it would have to be glute step-ups.

And not because just because they’re an excellent exercise for targeting and growing my glutes, although they are.

But because, like I mentioned earlier, everything you learn from doing glute step-ups, you can carry with you into every single other glute exercise you do.

Which brings me to the second reason why step-ups are so beneficial for glute growth.

They help you tremendously activate and engage your glutes, maybe for the first time ever.

I don’t know what it is about glute step-ups specifically, but they’re the first exercise where I ever actually felt the exercise in my glutes.

I used to be someone who would struggle to engage my glutes in all of my glute exercises. I’d usually only feel my quads or even my hamstrings working.

But after mastering glute step-ups, it was like a switch flipped.

Once I started from ground zero, using no weight at all and only focusing on pushing off the platform with my glutes, I activated my glute muscles, just like that.

And since then, my glutes have never not been activated.

This Mind to Muscle Connection Will Carry into Every Glute Exercise You Do

After mastering my glute engagement during glute step-ups, I was suddenly able to carry this engagement into every single other glute exercise I did.

And I was suddenly able to feel all my other glute exercises in my glutes.

I mean every other glute exercise. I’m talking hip thrusts, squats, bulgarian split squats, RDL’s, everything of mine improved after trying step-ups.

What this really means is that practicing and doing glute step-ups are what gave me a glute mind to muscle connection.

What Happens When You Develop a Mind to Muscle Connection in Your Glutes

If you’ve read my post on how to actually start feeling glute exercises in your glutes, instead of your quads, then you know just how important a glute mind to muscle connection is for your glute growth.

I really believe that it’s because of the technique that I learned from doing glute step ups that I was able to carry into all of my workouts moving forward.

Something about slowly stretching out your glutes and using only them to push yourself back up is the key motion to engaging your glutes.

I’m telling you, since then, my glute growth has been insane.

I can’t emphasize it enough how important step-ups have been on my glute journey and how happy I am that I discovered them.

So if you find yourself struggling with actually feeling glute exercises in your glutes like I did, then I really recommend you give glute step ups a try.

How to Do Glute Step-Ups For Maximum Results

Now, as beneficial as step-ups can be, they won’t be much of a help if you don’t master your form first.

However, mastering your form can be tricky and require some time and practice. Especially if you haven’t yet developed a mind to muscle glute connection.

But, with these tips, I truly believe anybody can master glute step-ups. And fairly easily, too.

Just focus on these pointers and keep them in mind during every set and rep you do.

A Step-By-Step Guide to Performing Glute Step-Ups:

1. First, you’ll need to grab any elevated surface in the gym, most likely a box or a bench, and place it against a wall.

You want this platform to be horizontal with the wall, since you’re going to want to be able to reach the wall when you step up onto the opposite edge.

2. Next, you’ll want to grab some form of additional weight, most likely either a dumbell or a kettlebell (I prefer a kettlebell).

And if you’re just starting out, using no weight is fine, too. I’d actually recommend starting out with no weight.

3. Step up onto the edge of the box, facing the wall. Standing on one leg with the other leg in the air.

4. Holding the weight in the same hand as your working leg, slowly lean forward and place your free hand (the one opposite your working leg) onto the wall for support.

5. Finally, slowly lower down with your working leg, sending your opposite leg down and back, keeping it in the air.

When you reach the bottom, pause, and push off and up until you get back into the starting position.

Essential Tips To Guarantee Your Step-Ups Are Most Effective:

If you ask me, this section is even more important than the actual steps themselves.

Because you can go through the steps perfectly, and yet still not be feeling the exercise at all in your glutes.

These Essential Tips Are:

1. Focus on applying the most force and pushing off into your heel.

Placing most of your weight on your heel is the best way to force your glutes to engage.

Whereas if you were to push off into your toes, or the front portion of your foot, you’d make it harder for your glutes to engage by biasing your quads.

2. Make each rep extremely slow, focusing on your time under tension

Increasing your time under tension, especially during the eccentric portion of the exercise, is how you’re going to start engaging your glutes.

By keeping each rep extremely slow, especially as you lower down, you can squeeze your glute muscles and really feel how your they’re engaging and working during each part of the entire movement.

3. Avoid letting your knees come forward over your heels.

Instead, try and keep your shins and knees in line with and directly over your heel.

When everything is in line, this forces you to send your hips back, biasing your glutes more.

Whereas when your knee comes forward, you place more tension on and target your quads more.

4. Focus on sending your hips back

Like I said in the last step, in order to keep your knee above your heel, and not let it come forward, you’ll need to send your hips back.

Think of this motion almost like a single leg RDL, where you send your hips back and out to the side. As opposed to moving your knee forward.

This will give you the biggest stretch on your upper, outer glutes.

5. Range of motion is good, but try not to overdo it.

Once you move passed a certain point in depth, your glutes lose engagement and your quads start to takeover.

Instead of lowering down too far, focus on only lowering down as far as where your glutes are still engaged. Usually somewhere above forming a 90 degree angle with your femur and shin.

6. The final most important point: Lift up by focusing on pushing off the platform.

The biggest mistake people make when doing step-ups is after hitting the bottom of the rep, when going back up into the starting position.

What they do is they’ll only be focused on getting back up to the top of the rep. And what they’ll do is just immediately straighten up and lift their upper body.

But don’t do this!

Instead, what you want to do is think of driving as much force from your glutes and into the platform, and using your glutes to actually push yourself back up.

This is how you’ll get your glutes to actually start working and being engaged.

The #1 Glute Step-Up Variation (That’s Just as Effective as The Original)

If you don’t think you have the balance for glute step-ups, find them intimidating, or don’t have the proper space or equipment in your gym, then no problem!

Because I have an excellent glute step-up variation that works just as well as the original exercise.

In fact, I usually find myself doing this variation even more than I do actual step-ups. That’s how well these work!

I like to call this variation front foot elevated lunges, but you might have also heard of them being called curtsey lunges.

You can probably tell, but I made up the first name for these. I prefer to call them “front foot elevated lunges” because it makes the exercise just a little more self-explanatory.

How To Do Front Foot Elevated Lunges:

1. First, grab a short, elevated platform.

Anything that’s about 5 to 10 inches off the ground will do. Even stacking up a couple 45 pound plates on the ground will work.

2. If you do these on a smith machine, which I prefer, then set up your elevated surface beneath the smith machine bar.

Otherwise, if you choose not to use a smith machine, then you can use dumbells or kettlebells to add additional weight.

3. Place your working leg on the surface, dangling your opposite leg behind you, off the surface.

4. Slowly lower down, just like you would a regular step-up.

However, instead of sending your opposite leg towards the ground, you’ll have to send it further behind you.

It’s even OK if this leg touches the ground to give yourself a little extra support.

5. Once you reach the bottom, push off and raise back up into the starting position.

Essentially with these, everything is about the same as a regular step-up.

The only differences are one, that you’re closer to the ground.

And two, you can either touch your opposite leg to the ground and use it for support. Or, you’ll need to focus on sending it back further behind you to avoid letting it touch the ground.

Besides that, the same tips I gave you for doing regular step-ups, should also be applied here.

Takeaways

Adding glute step-ups into your workout routine is one of the best things you can do for your glute growth.

Helping you activate your glutes, train them in a way that not a ton of other exercises do, and allowing you to develop a mind to muscle connection that can be applied to all your other glute exercises.

Letting you build and grow the the most well rounded, best shaped, bubbly glutes that so many of us are striving for.

More of My Posts On Women’s Weightlifting and Fitness:

6 Aspects of Your Life That Exercise Transforms

How to Stay Consistent in Your Fitness Routine [The Key to Success]

7 Essential Exercises for Women’s Muscle Growth