Burpees are done in four phases: from standing, you squat down and place your hands on the floor, kick your legs back into a plank (with or without a push-up), jump your feet back toward your hands, and stand up exploding into a vertical jump with your arms overhead. It is a total-body bodyweight exercise that combines strength, power, and cardiovascular conditioning in a single movement. Done well, it is one of the most effective tools for training endurance. Done poorly — soft back, sloppy rhythm — it becomes a way to get tired without actually training.
Which muscles and systems burpees work
The burpee is "total body" in the most literal sense: nearly the whole muscular chain participates, and the real stimulus is metabolic.
- Quads, glutes, and calves: drive the squat and the vertical jump.
- Chest, shoulders, and triceps: work in the plank phase and the optional push-up.
- Core: stabilizes the trunk during the leg kick-back and the foot pull-in, just like in a plank.
- Cardiovascular system: the real star. Alternating between standing and floor positions spikes heart rate quickly.
This combination makes the burpee a hybrid strength-cardio exercise, ideal in high-intensity protocols. To understand how to structure intense sessions at home, read our guide to the HIIT workout at home.
How to do burpees: step-by-step technique
The "clean" burpee has a controlled rhythm. Speed comes later, when the technique is automatic.
- Start standing. Feet shoulder-width, eyes forward, core braced.
- Squat and hands down. Bend hips and knees, lower down, and place your hands on the floor in front of your feet, shoulder-width.
- Kick back (plank). Shift your weight onto your hands and kick both feet back in one move into a rigid plank: body in line, glutes and abs squeezed. Do not let the hips sag.
- Push-up (optional). If you do it, lower your chest to the floor with elbows close to the body and press back up, keeping the line. No spinal "wave."
- Feet pull-in. With a small hop, bring your feet back toward your hands, returning to the squat. Aim to land your feet near your hands, not half a meter away.
- Vertical jump. Extend hips and knees and explode into a vertical jump, arms overhead. Land soft, knees slightly bent.
- Repeat at a steady pace. A pace you can sustain for the whole set beats starting fast and crashing.
Breathing and rhythm
In burpees, breathing tends to get chaotic because the movement is large and fast. Find a pattern: exhale on the effort phase (jump and stand-up), inhale on the way down. Do not hold your breath: that is the mistake that makes you "blow up" mid-set. The right pace is the sustainable one: in circuits, keeping a steady cadence matters more than sprinting the first 5 and stopping. Rhythm consistency is what makes burpees an effective cardio workout rather than a random sprint.
A useful pacing strategy for longer sets is to pick a rhythm you could hold for double the target. If you have to do 15 burpees, choose a cadence you could sustain for 30. It feels too slow at first, but it prevents the crash that turns the second half of the set into ragged, form-breaking reps. As you get fitter, the sustainable cadence naturally speeds up, and that increase in pace at the same quality is your real progress marker, more meaningful than a one-off record you cannot repeat.
Scaling: adapt burpees to your level
The full burpee with push-up and jump is demanding. The smart move is not to skip the exercise, but to scale it so you can do it with clean technique and adequate volume. Here is how to adjust it.
| Version | What you remove/add | For whom |
|---|---|---|
| Walk-out burpee | Step feet back instead of kicking, no jump | Absolute beginners, rehab |
| No-jump burpee | Stand up without a vertical jump, rest unchanged | Reducing knee impact |
| No-push-up burpee | Plank without lowering the chest, with final jump | More cardio, less pressing |
| Standard burpee | Push-up + vertical jump | Intermediate level |
| Burpee with push-up + tuck jump | Jump with knees to chest | Advanced, power focus |
| Burpee box jump-over | Jump onto a box instead of vertical jump | Advanced, conditioning |
The rule: pick the version that lets you keep technique for the whole set. If your back caves after 5 reps, scale down. There is no merit in a crooked burpee.
Prerequisites: what to be able to do before burpees
The burpee assembles three basic movements. If one of them is weak, the burpee suffers. It is worth having these foundations before pushing volume:
- Stable plank: you should be able to hold a rigid plank for at least 20-30 seconds without the hips sagging. If you cannot, the kick-back phase becomes your weak link. Build it up with our guide to ab and core exercises.
- Clean push-up: if you include the push-up, you should be able to do at least a few with good form. Otherwise use the no-push-up version until you build the press.
- Controlled squat and landing: you should be able to squat and land from a jump, absorbing with your knees and hips. A stiff landing, repeated hundreds of times, is the real joint-stress factor.
Building these prerequisites makes burpees safer and more effective: you can push the intensity knowing the technique holds.
Benefits of burpees: cardio and strength in one
- Cardiovascular conditioning: they raise heart rate fast and train endurance in little time.
- Training density: one exercise involves the whole body, ideal when you are short on time and have no equipment.
- Power: the final vertical jump trains lower-body explosiveness.
- Transferability: being bodyweight, they help athletes in sports where you must get off the ground quickly.
- Body composition: placed in a plan with a calorie deficit, they add to energy expenditure. Remember, though, that no single exercise "burns fat" on its own.
The most common burpee mistakes
- Soft back in the plank. The hips sag when you kick back. Squeeze glutes and abs like in a rigid plank.
- Too fast at the start. You blast off and collapse. Pick a pace sustainable for the whole set.
- Hard landing from the jump. Stiff knees on landing. Land soft, absorbing with knees and hips.
- "Wave" push-up. Chest and hips move at different times. Keep the line, lower and rise as one block.
- Feet landing too far back. On the pull-in the feet stay far from the hands, overloading the lower back when you stand. Bring them close to your hands.
- Neck hyperextension. Looking forward in the plank strains the neck. Neutral gaze.
How to use burpees in circuits
Burpees shine in interval and circuit formats. Some proven schemes:
- EMOM: Every Minute On the Minute, do a fixed number of burpees (e.g., 8-10) and rest in the remaining time.
- Tabata: 20 seconds of burpees, 10 rest, for 8 rounds (4 minutes total). Very intense.
- Mixed circuit: alternate burpees with other bodyweight moves (squats, mountain climbers, plank) in 30-40 second stations.
- Finisher: 2-3 sets of 8-12 burpees at the end of a session to close with intensity.
Start with low volumes and build gradually. A classic mistake is raising the number of burpees without checking quality: real progress is doing more clean reps in the same time, not more sloppy reps. Apply the progressive-overload principle to conditioning too: add a round, cut the rest, or shorten the target time week by week.
If you train with a structured program, tracking reps and times helps you see real progress: many athletes use Athleex to log circuits and sessions and compare performance over time. Athleex is free for your first 3 athletes with every feature included, so you can sign up free and start tracking right away. Want a conditioning plan built by a professional? You can find a personal trainer in the Athleex directory and train with the right guidance.
FAQ
How many burpees should I do a day? There is no universal number: it depends on your level, your other training, and your goals. For a beginner, 3-5 sets of 5-8 scaled burpees, a couple of times a week, is an excellent starting point. More trained people can place them in circuits or finishers with higher volumes. The priority is not the absolute number but quality: 30 clean burpees beat 100 crooked ones. Increase volume gradually and allow recovery, because being total-body they are very fatiguing. The "hundreds of burpees a day" challenges often lead more to technical compensations than to benefits.
Do burpees help you lose weight? Burpees alone do not cause weight loss, but they are an excellent tool inside a complete plan. They burn a lot of calories in little time because they involve the whole body and raise heart rate, so they add to energy expenditure. But fat loss depends on overall calorie balance: without a deficit sustained by nutrition and full training, no isolated exercise produces weight loss. Put burpees in a program that includes strength, adequate nutrition, and consistency, and they become an effective ally. As a single "fat-burning trick," they do not work.
Burpees with or without a push-up: which is better? It depends on the goal and level. The push-up version adds pressing work for chest, shoulders, and triceps, making the burpee more complete from a strength standpoint. The no-push-up version reduces upper-body demand and lets you keep a higher pace, so it is preferable if you mainly want the cardio stimulus or if the push-up breaks your technique. There is no absolute "right" choice: pick the version that lets you finish the set with clean form and adapt it as you improve.
Are burpees bad for your back? The burpee is not inherently harmful, but poor technique can overload the lower back, especially when the hips sag in the plank phase or when you stand up sloppily with feet far from the hands. The key is to keep the core braced and the back in line in every phase, exactly like a rigid plank. If you have pre-existing back issues, reduce impact with scaled versions (no jump, walk-out) and, to be safe, consider consulting a professional before loading big volumes. With correct technique and gradual progression, the risk is low.
How often can I train burpees? Being a high-intensity total-body exercise, burpees are very fatiguing. For most athletes, placing them 2-3 times a week in circuits or finishers is a good balance between stimulus and recovery. You can do them more often with low volumes and scaled versions, but frequent intense sessions risk accumulating fatigue without giving the body time to adapt. Alternate burpee sessions with days dedicated to strength or active recovery, and monitor how you respond: if performance drops and you feel constantly tired, space them out more.
