Knee push-ups
Muscles worked : Chest, triceps · Shoulders, core
How to do it
- Get onto all fours, then walk your hands forward slightly wider than your shoulders.
- Cross your ankles and keep your knees on the floor as the pivot point.
- Line the body up straight from knees to head, without breaking at the hips.
- Bend the elbows to about 45° from the body and lower your chest close to the floor.
- Push back up without snapping the elbows straight.
Common mistakes
- Hips too high or too low: breaks the line of the torso.
- Elbows flared to 90°: overloads the shoulders.
- An incomplete descent: reduces the effect of the movement.
Where you should feel it
Chest and triceps, with the core working from hips to shoulders. Wrist discomfort almost always comes from the hands being too far back: they belong under the shoulders, not in front of them.
Range of motion
Lower until your chest is a fist’s height from the floor. If the full range costs you the alignment, shorten it: a clean half range builds more than a full one that folds at the hips.
Tempo and breathing
Two seconds down, one up, with no pause at the bottom so the tension stays. Inhale down, exhale on the push.
What works, precisely
The same prime movers as the standard push-up — pectoralis major, triceps brachii, anterior deltoid — but with a shortened lever. The serratus anterior stabilises the shoulder blade while the abdominals and glutes stop the hips sagging.
Movement mechanics
A horizontal push, like the incline push-up, but the knee contact shortens the lever: the share of bodyweight actually lifted drops by roughly a third. This is a regression of the lever, not of the range — an important distinction, because the range stays full.
Benefits
- Lets you train the full range of a push-up while the floor version is still out of reach.
- Loads the core over a shorter segment, so it is easier to keep aligned late in a set.
- Forms the natural intermediate step between the incline push-up and the floor push-up.
Adapt and progress
- Easier : Go back to an incline push-up on a high support, where the core is less taxed.
- Harder : Walk the knees forward to lengthen the lever, or move to a floor push-up.
- Move on when : When three sets of twelve go by with a perfectly straight line from knees to head, try a floor push-up.
Precautions
Put a cushion or mat under the knees: discomfort on a hard floor ends the set before the muscle tires.