6 Killer Exercises That Will Add Serious Inches to Your Arms

We, here at The Cheat Sheet, know you want big arms. We’ve made it our mission to help you get there, too. We’ve written about how you can build arm muscle without weights, exercises you can do that will really help meld those arms with your upper-body, and, of course, simple workouts that can get you started with building your arms, and even more that will help you target individual parts.

Clearly, we’re all about the arms.

But that doesn’t mean we’ve fleshed-out everything yet. In fact, we have even more in store for you, especially for those of you who are looking to really kick things into overdrive, and take your arm-building workouts to the next level. Once you’ve built a solid foundation of muscle, using your traditional lifts and exercises — bench press, overhead press, etc. — it’s time to switch things up, particularly if you want to add some serious inches to your measurements.

After digging around, we’ve discovered a handful of tough and somewhat unconventional exercises that should help you burst through your plateau. These moves should help trigger new muscle growth, and fight off any cases of muscle memory you may be experiencing, helping to propel your upper-body appendages to new heights — or girths.

So here they are, six exercises that will help you add even more inches to your arms.

1. Hammer Curls

Hammer curls don’t just sound badass. They are badass. So badass, in fact, that a lot of people simply can’t handle them, and need to work their way up.

If you really want to give your biceps a workout, hammer curls are a good way to go. They’re a slight variation of traditional curls, and are often called ‘netural-grip curls’. They’re simple to execute, as you merely keep your palms parallel when performing the lift.

2. Reverse Barbell Curl

A twist on a classic, the reverse barbell curl can prove, for some, to be quite challenging. The reverse curl will shift some of the brunt of the work from your biceps to your forearms, which will help build muscle in an area not-often targeted by conventional lifts. And doing the exercise itself is pretty simple, all it requires is a re-positioning of the hands so that you’re grasping the bar with your palms facing downward. Think of how you hold the bar when doing cleans; it’s like that.

3. Grasshopper Pushups

Standard pushups will only do so much for you — so switching it up, and throwing your body a curveball, can help with additional muscle growth and tone. One pushup variation is the grasshopper pushup, which you can see demonstrated above. Getting the movement down can be awkward at first, but once you’ve nailed the form and execution, you’ll see improvement in not just your arms, but your abs and chest as well.

4. Cable Push-Down

For the cable pushdown, you’ll need access to some gym equipment, and required attachments. To get the gist of the exercise, take a look at the demonstration video above. It’s a fairly simple movement — fully extending your arm — but you can see from the way Savas Cebeci is doing it, that his arm muscles are really feeling it. Using a rope attachment, this is one of the premiere ways to target your triceps, which will lead to well-rounded, muscular arms.

5. French Press

The French Press is a lift that can be done from either the seated position, or standing. It’s an exercise that really hammers at your triceps, and requires only a barbell or dumbbell to perform. As you’ll see in the demonstration video above, it’s relatively simple — but can be much more difficult than you might think. You’re basically keeping your elbows in a fixed position, pulling weight behind your head, and pushing it straight above. One rep, and you’ll feel it. For targeting your triceps, there are few exercises that are more successful.

6. Chin-Ups
pull ups, exercise

Chin-ups differ from just about every other exercise on this list in one important way: They’re simple. But their simplicity is what makes them such an ingenious and timeless exercise. Chin-ups are a fantastic way to put your entire upper-body to work, and can really give your arm muscles a run for their money. It’s why we feature them on so many of our exercise lists — they’re just too good to leave off.

Though they seem like identical exercises, make sure you’re getting your form down, and performing a chin-up, rather than a pull-up. There are some differences in the muscles and joints that are worked, so read into it a bit more to get the dirty details. We suggest going for chin-ups, as they trigger more work within major muscle groups.