Muscle hub
Triceps Exercises
Effective exercise guides for training the triceps, improving elbow extension, and lock-out pressing power.
23 exercises in the library
Three-Head Anatomy
All three triceps heads, long, lateral, and medial, share an insertion at the elbow and extend it together, but only the long head crosses the shoulder joint too, and elbow position determines how much of the load it takes. With the upper arm at the side, as in the tricep pushdown or a dips variation, the long head is in a shortened position at the shoulder and contributes less than the lateral and medial heads. The lateral head sits on the outside of the upper arm and is the most active during heavier, elbow-fixed pressing, which makes it the head most already trained during compound pressing work. The medial head lies deep and activates consistently across nearly all triceps exercises regardless of arm position, so it rarely needs a dedicated variation the way the long head does.
Long-Head Shoulder-Elevation Loading
Because the long head is the only one of the three that crosses the shoulder as well as the elbow, its loading depends on shoulder position in a way the lateral and medial heads never do. Raising the upper arm overhead, as in the overhead tricep extension, stretches the long head across both joints at once and increases the tension it takes through the movement, which is why overhead extensions tend to produce more long-head-specific soreness than pushdowns at the same relative load. This same shoulder-elevation principle is why a program that only trains the triceps with the arm at the side, pushdowns and kickbacks, can leave the long head undertrained relative to the other two heads even while total triceps volume looks adequate on paper.
Stretch vs Pushdown Resolution
Elbow angle at the bottom of a press changes triceps involvement independent of shoulder position: the close-grip bench press narrows the grip to keep the elbows tucked and shifts more of the pressing load onto the triceps relative to a standard-width bench press, where the chest and shoulders take a larger share. Because every horizontal and vertical press finishes with elbow extension, direct triceps work overlaps with existing pressing volume more than most other isolation choices; a heavy bench or overhead press session already trains the lateral and medial heads hard, so extra direct volume is best allocated to a long-head-biased, stretch-position movement like an overhead extension or tricep kickback rather than another shortened-position pushdown variation.
See tricep exercises to sort the full list by which head each movement emphasizes.
Exercises
- Arnold Press
- Barbell Bench Press
- Close-Grip Bench Press
- Close-Grip Push-Up
- Decline Bench Press
- Decline Push-Up
- Dips
- Dumbbell Bench Press
- Dumbbell Floor Press
- Dumbbell Shoulder Press
- Incline Bench Press
- Incline Dumbbell Press
- Incline Push-Up
- Knee Push-Up
- Landmine Press
- Machine Chest Press
- Machine Overhead Press
- Overhead Press
- Overhead Tricep Extension
- Push-Up
- Skull Crusher
- Tricep Kickback
- Tricep Pushdown
Frequently Asked Questions
- What exercise builds the long head of the triceps?
- Overhead movements like the [overhead tricep extension](/exercises/overhead-tricep-extension/) place the long head in a fully stretched position across the shoulder, maximizing its recruitment compared to movements performed with arms at your sides.
- How do pushdowns compare to skull crushers?
- Cable [tricep pushdowns](/exercises/tricep-pushdown/) bias the lateral and medial heads with peak tension near full extension. Skull crushers position the humerus vertically, loading the long head through a greater eccentric stretch.
- How many sets of triceps should you do per week?
- Because compound pressing already taxes the triceps, 6 to 10 direct isolation sets per week divided across two workouts is generally optimal. Balance one overhead extension with one pushdown or dip variation.