Bench Dips
Also works: Chest · Shoulders
Hands behind you on a bench edge, legs out in front, lowering until the elbows reach roughly 90 degrees and pressing back up. It needs nothing but a bench and loads the triceps well — but the hands-behind-the-body position is the most shoulder-hostile arrangement in common gym use, and depth is the whole argument.
Own the movement
Set up first, then execute. Every cue below is something you can check on your next set.
Before the first rep
- Sit on the bench edge, hands gripping the edge just outside your hips, fingers pointing forward.
- Slide your hips forward until they clear the bench by a few centimetres — no further, or the bar of your arms angles backwards.
- Heels on the floor with legs bent for the easier version; heels on a second bench with legs straight for the hard one.
- Set your chest tall and pull your shoulder blades down and back before the first rep, and keep them there.
Every rep
Breathing & tempo — Inhale on the descent, exhale on the press. Two seconds down, no bounce at the bottom, one second up with a definite lockout.
Before you load it
- Make sure the bench cannot slide. A bench on a smooth floor that shifts mid-rep drops you onto your hands with your shoulders already extended.
Sets, reps & load
Where to start, and what to change when it stops being hard.
Start with knees bent and heels close to the bench — that removes a large share of the load. Progress by walking the feet out, then straightening the legs, then elevating the heels on a second bench, and only then by resting a plate across your thighs. When you can do 20 strict reps with straight legs, move to parallel bar dips rather than stacking more plates on this one.
What goes wrong
The errors that show up most often, and the cue that fixes each one.
Stop at 90 degrees at the elbow. Have someone watch from the side, or set a low box under your hips as a depth marker for a few sets until the height is automatic.
Stay within a few centimetres of the bench edge and let your back graze it on every rep. If you keep drifting, put your feet closer in — the drift is usually a leg position problem.
Squeeze your elbows toward each other and keep the forearms vertical. If they will not stay in, bend your knees to reduce the load until they will.
Actively depress the shoulder blades before you start and hold that all set. Once the shoulders creep up, the joint is taking load the triceps should be handling — end the set.
Why bother
With your hands fixed behind your torso, the triceps have to extend the elbow while the shoulder is already in extension and internal rotation. That combination puts the long head of the triceps on a long lever and makes the movement genuinely hard at bodyweight, which is why so many people can bench respectably and still struggle with fifteen strict bench dips.
The same geometry is the problem. Going deep drives the head of the humerus forward against the front of the joint capsule, and the deeper you sink, the more of the load the shoulder absorbs instead of the triceps. Stopping at about 90 degrees of elbow bend is not a soft option — it is the range where the triceps are doing the work and the shoulder is not being pried apart.
Where it fits
End of a push session, 2-3 sets to a couple of reps short of failure. If you have access to parallel bars, a dip station is a better movement in every respect and this becomes your travel and home option. Do not put it on the same day as heavy overhead pressing if your shoulders already talk to you.
If this one isn't it
No kit, too hard, or too easy — here's where to go instead.
Same job, different kit
Start here instead
When this gets easy
Asked and answered
Are bench dips bad for your shoulders?
Deep ones, yes, for a lot of people. The hands-behind-the-body position already places the shoulder in extension and internal rotation, and sinking below 90 degrees at the elbow pushes the humeral head forward against the front of the capsule. Kept shallow and controlled they are fine; taken to maximum depth for high reps they are the most common way lifters give themselves front-of-shoulder pain.
Bench dips or parallel bar dips?
Parallel bars, every time, if you have them. Your hands sit beside your torso instead of behind it, the shoulder is in a far safer position, and you can load the movement properly with a belt. Bench dips are the version for a hotel room with nothing but a chair.
Why can I bench 100 kg but only manage ten bench dips?
Different job for the triceps. On a bench press the chest and front delt carry most of the load and the triceps finish the rep; on a bench dip the shoulder is behind your torso, the chest has almost no leverage, and the triceps extend the elbow against most of your bodyweight from a long-lever position. A strong bench does not transfer here, and a low rep count on these is not a sign that something is wrong.
Do these build chest as well as triceps?
Barely. Some lower chest and front delt gets involved, but with your hands behind you the chest has almost no leverage. Treat this as a triceps movement and get your chest work from pressing.