Pull Day Workout: Best Back & Biceps Routine
A complete pull session that trains your whole back, rear delts and biceps — with a full gym workout table, a home and band variant, and clear guidance on where pull day fits in a push/pull/legs week.
- Pull day trains every "pulling" muscle: lats, traps, rhomboids, lower back, rear delts, biceps and forearms.
- Lead with a heavy hinge or vertical pull, then horizontal rows, then rear-delt and arm work — see the full session table.
- Keep big pulls at 5–10 reps and isolation work at 10–15 reps.
- Train pull once or twice a week, leaving at least 48 hours between sessions.
- A pull-up bar plus resistance bands lets you run the whole session at home.
Pull day is the back-and-biceps half of the most popular training split going. If you train each muscle by movement pattern rather than by body part, a "pull" session groups together every exercise where you draw a weight toward your body — and that turns out to be a beautifully efficient way to organise a workout. Your lats, traps, rhomboids, rear delts and biceps all assist each other on these lifts, so training them together means they fatigue together and recover together. This guide gives you a complete pull day workout, a home version that needs nothing but a bar and bands, and a plain explanation of how to slot it into your week.
What is a pull day?
A pull day is a single training session built entirely from pulling movements. Anatomically, it covers the muscles of your back — the latissimus dorsi (the big wing muscles that create width), the trapezius and rhomboids (the upper-back muscles that retract your shoulder blades), and the erector spinae of the lower back. It also trains the rear deltoids at the back of your shoulders, and the biceps, brachialis and forearm flexors, which all bend the elbow and grip the bar.
The logic is simple. Every time you row, pull down or curl, your biceps are working alongside your back. Train them on separate days and you risk overlapping fatigue; train them together on a dedicated pull day and the whole chain gets one focused, recoverable dose. For a deeper look at the individual movements, our guide to the best exercises for back breaks down each one.
Push vs pull — and where pull day fits
The counterpart to pull day is push day, which trains the muscles that press a weight away from you: chest, shoulders (front and side) and triceps. Add a leg day and you have the classic push/pull/legs (PPL) split. The beauty of PPL is that no muscle is trained two days running, so recovery sorts itself out automatically.
A typical six-day PPL week looks like this — pull lands twice, giving your back ample weekly volume:
| Day | Session | Main focus |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Push | Chest, shoulders, triceps |
| Tuesday | Pull | Back, rear delts, biceps |
| Wednesday | Legs | Quads, hamstrings, glutes |
| Thursday | Push | Chest, shoulders, triceps |
| Friday | Pull | Back, rear delts, biceps |
| Saturday | Legs | Quads, hamstrings, glutes |
| Sunday | Rest | Recovery |
Short on time? Run PPL three days a week (one push, one pull, one legs) and rotate. Either way, pull day stays exactly as written below.
The full pull day workout
Order matters. Start with the most demanding lift while you are fresh — a hinge or a vertical pull — then work through horizontal rows, rear-delt isolation, and finally direct arm work. That sequence trains the biggest muscles when you have the most energy and finishes with the smaller ones that need less. Choose loads that leave you one or two reps short of failure on your last set.
| Exercise | Sets × reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|
| Deadlift or rack pull | 3 × 5 | 2–3 min |
| Pull-up or lat pulldown | 3 × 6–10 | 2 min |
| Barbell or dumbbell row | 3 × 8–10 | 90 s |
| Seated cable row | 3 × 10–12 | 90 s |
| Face pull (rear delts) | 3 × 12–15 | 60 s |
| Barbell or dumbbell biceps curl | 3 × 10–12 | 60 s |
| Hammer curl (brachialis) | 2 × 12–15 | 60 s |
| Dumbbell or barbell shrug | 2 × 12–15 | 60 s |
That is roughly 21 working sets across 50–60 minutes. The deadlift and a vertical pull build raw back strength and lat width; the two rows build the thickness through your mid-back; the face pull keeps your rear delts and rotator cuff healthy and your posture honest; the curls and shrugs finish the biceps and traps directly. If you are new to pulling overhead, our step-by-step how to do pull-ups guide will get you your first rep.
Deadlifts and rack pulls are the most fatiguing lift here. Brace your core, keep the bar close to your shins, and never round your lower back to chase a heavier weight. Nail your deadlift form before loading the bar — if your back is already tired, swap to a rack pull or skip it and lead with rows.
Home & resistance-band variant
You do not need a gym to train pull. A doorway pull-up bar and a set of resistance bands cover almost the entire session. The rep ranges climb slightly because band tension is lower at the start of each rep, so a few extra reps keep the muscle under enough tension to grow.
| Exercise | Sets × reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|
| Pull-up (or band-assisted) | 3 × 5–10 | 2 min |
| Inverted row (under a table) | 3 × 10–15 | 90 s |
| Band lat pulldown (anchor high) | 3 × 12–15 | 90 s |
| Band bent-over row | 3 × 12–15 | 60 s |
| Band face pull | 3 × 15–20 | 60 s |
| Band or backpack biceps curl | 3 × 12–15 | 60 s |
Loaded a sturdy backpack with books gives you an adjustable weight for rows and curls when bands feel light. For a full no-kit session, see our home workout with no equipment.
Reps, frequency and form that lasts
Keep the big compound pulls — deadlifts, pull-ups, heavy rows — in the 5–10 rep range to build strength and back thickness. Push the isolation work — face pulls, curls, shrugs — into the 10–15 rep range, where smaller muscles respond best and your joints stay comfortable. Progress with progressive overload: when you hit the top of a range on every set, add a little weight and drop back to the bottom.
The most common pull-day mistake is yanking with the biceps and letting the back switch off. Before each rep, think "squeeze the shoulder blades down and together," then drive the elbows toward your hips. Your arms should feel like hooks, not engines.
Train pull once or twice a week with at least 48 hours between sessions. If you want a different structure entirely, the upper/lower split trains the same muscles fewer times per week with more per-session volume, and a full-body routine folds pulling into every workout. Whatever you choose, eat enough protein, train hard but honestly, and — as always — check with a doctor before starting if you have any health concerns. New to lifting altogether? Start with how to build muscle for the fundamentals, then come back to this session.
Sources & further reading
- National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) — resistance-training programme design and exercise order.
- American Council on Exercise (ACE) — exercise library: back and biceps movements.
- American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) — resistance-training position stand.
External links are provided for reference and do not imply endorsement. arsenal.fit is an independent publisher and is not affiliated with any cited organisation.