Rear Delt Exercises: 5 Best Moves for Rounder Shoulders

Rear delt exercises are the cheapest upgrade most lifters skip. The rear delt is a small muscle, it recovers fast and it only needs light weights, but it's the part that makes your shoulders look round from the side and finished from behind.

Most beginners train the front of their body hard and the back of their shoulders barely at all. Bench press, push-ups and overhead presses all hit the front delts, while the rear delts only get a little help from rows, and the lats and rhomboids usually take most of that. The result shows in photos: shoulders that look flat from the side, a slight forward roll, and a back that seems to stop at the shoulder blades. Two short blocks of rear delt work a week, done light and strict, fix most of that within 8 to 12 weeks.

Before

After

The work, step by step

1. What the rear delt does (and why rows aren't enough). The rear delt sits on the back of your shoulder and pulls your upper arm backward and out to the side, especially when your arm is already raised in front of you. Picture swinging your arm back with the elbow at shoulder height: that's its main job. Rows do involve it, but on a normal row your elbow stays low and close to your body, so the lats and mid back do most of the pulling. The best rear delt exercises keep your elbows wide, around 60 to 90 degrees out from your torso, and use weights light enough that the bigger back muscles don't take over. If you can feel your shoulder blades squeezing hard on every rep, the work has moved to your rhomboids.
2. Reverse pec deck: 3 sets of 12 to 20. If your gym has one, start here. It's the easiest rear delt exercise to learn because the machine holds the path for you. Sit facing the pad, set the seat so the handles are at shoulder height, and use the neutral grip (palms facing each other) or the horizontal one. Sweep your arms back in a wide arc until they're roughly in line with your body, pause for a second, and return over 2 seconds. Don't pull past your body line, because that extra bit is all shoulder blade squeeze. Most beginners use 15 to 30 kg on the stack. If you can do more than that in week one, check that your shoulders aren't shrugging up toward your ears.
3. Dumbbell rear delt fly: 3 sets of 15 to 20. The one you can do anywhere. Lie face down on a bench set to about 30 to 45 degrees, or bend over at the hips with your chest almost parallel to the floor and your forehead resting on a bench. Let light dumbbells hang straight down with your palms facing each other, keep a soft bend in your elbows, and raise your arms out to the sides until they're level with your body. Lead with your pinkies slightly turned up and think about pushing the dumbbells out to the walls. Start with 2 to 5 kg per hand. That will feel embarrassingly light. It's supposed to: by rep 15 the back of your shoulder should burn, and if your arms swing up with momentum, drop a kilo.
4. Cable rear delt fly: 3 sets of 12 to 15. Cables keep tension on the rear delt at the start of the rep, where dumbbells go slack. Set two pulleys at shoulder height, cross the cables so your right hand holds the left cable and your left hand holds the right one, and use no handles, just the ball stoppers in your fingers. Stand in the middle and pull your arms back and out until they make a wide T. One arm at a time works too, standing side-on with the pulley across your body. Start at 2.5 to 5 kg per side. This is the best rear delt exercise to rotate in after a few weeks of dumbbell flies, because the different resistance curve gives the muscle something new to adapt to.
5. Face pull and band pull-apart: the shoulder-health pair. Face pull: 3 sets of 12 to 20. Set a rope at forehead height, grab the ends with your thumbs pointing back, and pull toward your face while spreading the rope apart so your hands end up beside your ears and your elbows stay high. It works the rear delts plus the small rotator cuff muscles that keep your shoulders healthy under all that pressing. Use a light weight, 10 to 20 kg on most stacks, and pause for a second at the end. Band pull-apart: 2 sets of 20 to 30 with a light resistance band held at chest height, pulled apart until it touches your chest. It's the easiest rear delt exercise at home, and a set between bench press sets costs you nothing.
6. Put it into your week: 8 to 10 sets, twice a week. Day A (on push or shoulder day): reverse pec deck or dumbbell rear delt fly 3x12-20, face pull 3x12-20. Day B (on back or pull day): cable rear delt fly 3x12-15, band pull-apart 2x20-30. That's 11 hard sets a week, which is plenty for a muscle this size, and each block takes about 10 minutes. Do them early in the session if your rear delts are clearly lagging, or at the end if you're short on time. Progress by adding reps first: once you hit the top of the range on every set with a 1-second pause, go up the smallest step you can (1 kg dumbbells or one plate on the stack). Rear delts grow slowly but steadily, and most people see a rounder shoulder from the side around week 8 to 10, faster if they eat about 1.6 g of protein per kg of bodyweight.

Common pitfalls

• Going heavy. If you need momentum to move the weight, your traps and lower back are doing it. Rear delts respond to light weights, high reps and a pause at the back.
• Squeezing your shoulder blades hard together on every rep. Keep them still and let your arms move, or the exercise turns into upper back work.
• Letting your elbows drop toward your sides. Low elbows turn a rear delt fly into a row, so keep them wide and roughly at shoulder height.
• Only training them at the end of a long session. If they're a weak point, move them to the start twice a week for a couple of months.

Pro tip: Check your rear delts with a side photo, not a mirror. Stand relaxed, arms hanging, phone on a shelf at shoulder height with window light from the front. When the back of your shoulder starts to fill out, the line from your arm to your upper back looks round instead of dipping in, and you'll see it side by side long before you notice it in the gym.

How Muscle Editor fits in

Run a photo from behind through Muscle Editor's Shoulders editor at Fit to see what fuller rear and side delts would look like on your own frame. That's close to what a few months of consistent rear delt work can add, and having that picture makes the light, boring fly sets easier to keep doing. Treat it as a goal picture, not proof of progress.

Frequently asked questions

Filed under Workouts. Tagged: shoulders, rear delts, delts, workout, beginners.