Your back isn’t one muscle; it’s a multi-layer network of more than a dozen muscles, all working to support your spine, stabilize your torso, and move your limbs. But when it comes to strength training, one muscle deserves most of your attention: the lats.

Short for latissimus dorsi, these long and wide muscles help you stay upright, pull your arms down, and—when trained properly—build serious upper-body strength. They’re essential for posture, pulling power, and creating a more balanced, resilient physique.

If you’re not sure where to start, we consulted Peloton Instructor Rebecca Kennedy and Brian Sutton, who oversees the development of certification and continuing education courses at the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), for tips on how to train your lats, including the best lat exercises to add to your routine and how to incorporate them into your existing workouts.

What Are the Lat Muscles?

Your latissimus dorsi (aka lats) are the broad, wing-shaped muscles that span from your mid-to-lower back and sweep up toward your upper arms. The primary function is to pull your arms down and to your sides. In everyday life, you use your lats when you lower your bag from the top shelf of your closet or pull a heavy door shut. They also help keep you upright by working with your chest muscles to maintain good posture. 

The Benefits of Doing Lat Exercises

“The lats are one of the largest muscles in the upper body,” says Sutto. “They’re essential for pulling strength and help stabilize both the shoulder and spine, which supports better posture and overall movement.”

Training your lats helps preserve muscle mass and pulling strength as you age, which supports healthy posture, protects your joints, and contributes to overall movement longevity. Strength training, in general, is also linked to increased bone density and reduced injury risk. Strength training is “incredibly important for our overall health, especially as we get older, and becomes a non-negotiable,” Rebecca says.

4 of the Best Lat Exercises to Try

Below are four exercises that Rebecca suggests incorporating into your strength workout split (whether you train your full body, separate your training by muscle group, or follow a push-pull workout split). The back exercises below can be performed with dumbbells, kettlebells, and bands, and are all featured in workouts that you can find in the strength workouts on the Peloton App or Peloton Strength+.

1. Lawnmower Row

2. Kettlebell Gorilla Row

3. Dumbbell Lat Pullover

4. Band-Assisted Pull-Up

Tips to Keep in Mind When Training Your Lats

It can be hard to “feel” your lats during training. That’s partly because your lats are connected to a plethora of other muscles, so truly isolating them isn’t possible. How you’re performing the exercises could be another reason why; if your form is incorrect, it will take the focus off your lats and put it onto another muscle. 

Here are four technique details—two you should add into your training and two you should avoid—courtesy of Rebecca and Sutton. 

Do: Drive Your Elbows to Your Hips

“It’s very common, especially in bent-over positions, to shrug the shoulders as you pull, but this doesn’t target the lats and instead puts unnecessary stress on the neck and shoulders,” Rebecca says. 

To fix this common faux pas, think about leading all pulling movements with your elbows. Keep them close to your sides and drive them toward your back pocket at the bottom of each rep—squeezing your shoulder blades together and pushing them down as your complete the pull. 

Don’t: Rotate Your Hips

During single-arm rows (aka lawn mower rows), especially, it’s easy to let your hips twist, but that cheats your lats. “When you twist and ‘open’ your hips, you’re essentially getting help from your trunk and lower body to help make the line of pulling easier,” Rebecca explains. 

The fix is simple: Keep your torso and hips square to the floor throughout the rep. If your shoulders stay level and your glutes stay still, it’ll help you properly engage your lats.

Do: Use a Full Range of Motion—or Intentional Half Reps

Using a full range of motion—which is a key component of good form—increases muscle tension by stretching and contracting the lats through their entire available path. 

“Retract and depress your shoulder blades, avoid swinging, and control the bottom of the rep where your lats are most stretched,” Sutton explains. “Deep loaded stretches are where real muscle growth can happen.”

In fact, newer research shows that so-called “lengthened partials”—half reps performed in the stretched part of a lift—can be just as effective for muscle growth as full reps. One 2025 study published in PeerJ found that upper body gains from stretch-focused half-reps were nearly identical to those from full-ROM training. Another study in the European Journal of Sport Science showed comparable results for lower body muscle gains in women.

For example, after a set of full-range-of-motion band-assisted pull-ups, squeeze out three to four more reps from full extension to eye level. You don’t want to replace all your reps with half reps, but adding them at the end of a set can help you push towards muscular failure and ensure you’re really feeling the target muscle.

Don’t: Lift Too Light

“Lifting weight that’s too light can lead to poor form because your body doesn’t feel the proper feedback to ensure thoughtful mechanics,” says Rebecca. “A little extra resistance helps you move better as it forces muscle recruitment, motor control, and cleaner mechanics.”

How heavy is heavy enough? Choose a weight that leaves you with just one to two reps in the tank. If you’re aiming for eight reps, you should maybe be able to grind out 10.

If you’re planning your own workouts, you can also try the reverse pyramid structure. It’s a popular and effective method, endorsed by NASM, that entails starting with your heaviest set first, then reducing the weight slightly and increasing the reps with each subsequent set. For example, you might start with 6 reps with 60 pounds, then do 8 reps with 50 pounds, then 12 reps with 40 pounds.

How to Include Lat Exercises In Your Workout Routine

If you’d like to focus on increasing the strength and size of your lats for general functional fitness, try training them twice per week, Rebecca suggests. She recommends performing one to two exercises in the strength-endurance rep range, and one to two exercises in the hypertrophy rep range. If your goal is to increase maximal strength, then replace your hypertrophy lifts with exercises performed in the max strength rep range.

Here’s how all those rep ranges break down, including about how heavy you might want to lift, expressed as a percentage of your one rep max (1RM):

“To continue making progress, gradually increase the intensity or volume of your back workouts,” explains Sutton. “This can be achieved by increasing the weight, reps, or sets of your exercises over time.” Sutton is talking about a training principle called progressive overload, and it’s the linchpin of effective training. Aim to do a little bit more—following Sutton’s guidance above—every workout, or at least every week. One extra rep per week doesn’t seem like much, but it adds up over time.

The Takeaway

Whether you’re looking to improve posture, build long-term pulling strength, or simply move with more control and power, adding some dedicated lat exercises to your training can go a long way. Consider working your lats twice per week and incorporating both horizontal and vertical pulls (such as pullovers and rows) to train your lats through their different movement patterns. As these exercises become easier, add reps, sets, or weight to keep challenging your strength. Finally, don't forget to prioritize sleep, nutrition, and proper recovery; muscle and strength are forged between workouts, not during them.