50 Best Shoulder Exercises of All Time

The best shoulder exercises are advantageous for a number of reasons. While a fat-burning diet and abs exercises can help reveal a six-pack, that's largely for vanity. With dedicated shoulder workouts, you can forge more robust stabilizer muscles and rotator cuffs, which can ward off overuse injuries. Upper body exercises, aside from adding more size and strength to your frame, assist in everyday life.

Shaking up your go-to routine and doing dedicated shoulder workouts or adding shoulder exercises in tandem with the best back exercises, biceps exercises, and chest exercises will yield major dividends. The overhead press and lateral raise are definitely in the top tier of muscle-building moves, but they can only do so much to build strong, functional shoulders. Your gains will stagnate if you're not introducing new challenges.

By working your muscles in different planes of motion and targeting smaller (usually underutilized) stabilizing muscles, you'll fortify your joints against injury and, let's face it, create the ultimate aesthetic, too.

What Are the Shoulder Muscles?

The shoulder is arguably the body’s most underrated power generator, controlling the movement of your arms. There’s a reason we call it "shouldering" rather than “hipping” or “kneeing” a burden. The deltoids—anterior, lateral, and posterior—draw the most attention since they bulk up nicely in the gym.

However, the four rotator cuff muscles—supraspinatus, infraspinatus, teres minor, and subscapularis—are more responsible for supporting the shoulder joint. They allow the shoulder to move. And the scapular muscles—rhomboids, traps, levator scapulae, and serratus anterior—reside on or around the shoulder blade and contribute to shoulder stability, like the rotator cuff.

Benefit of Shoulder Exercises

These days, people are more hunched over, and thus, appear shorter due to sedentary lifestyles and being slouched over smartphones. It's produced a population with rounded shoulders and an epidemic of torn labrums, rotator cuff tendinitis, tennis elbow, and other ailments when people try to perform everyday movements, let alone engage in athletic activity.

Many strength training exercises contribute to shoulder instability, overuse, and injury when the shoulders are not correctly aligned. That’s why any discussion of building shoulder mass must include instructions on how to stabilize the shoulders and keep them in their intended position.

Shoulder exercises produce attractive mass that fills out T-shirts nicely. But when executed with a focus on stability and improving posture, they can produce a physique that’s also resistant to injury and long-term deterioration.

Here are 50 of the best shoulder exercises—from tried-and-true Arnold presses to upright rows to push presses—that'll improve your range of motion, add size, and build strength.

Some of the shoulder exercises below require a full gym with machines. Others can be done with standard home-gym equipment such as dumbbells, barbells, suspension trainers, and exercise bands. Traveling or training outside of a gym? We've included bodyweight exercises to do at home, too.

Best Shoulder Exercise for Delts: Arnold Press

Why It Works

A move named for the bodybuilder who used his broad shoulders to win seven Mr. Olympia titles and launch an epic film career that took him to the California governor’s mansion has instant credibility. Arnold Schwarzenegger invented the Arnold press to work all three heads of the deltoids (anterior, mediolateral, posterior) in one move to produce better muscle development and strength and bring more efficiency to workouts. By taking the shoulders through all three planes of motion, the Arnold press improves shoulder stability and decreases the potential for injury.

How to Do It

1. Stand holding dumbbells in each hand at shoulder height, palms facing your chest, to start.

2. Press the dumbbells upward while simultaneously twisting your wrists so you finish with your palms facing away from you as you lock out your elbows.

3. Reverse the motion as you lower.

4. That's 1 rep.

5. Note: You can do this sitting or standing.

Best Shoulder Exercise for Rotator Cuffs: 90-90 External Rotation

Why It Works

Your rotator cuff is a ball-and-socket joint that lets you move your arms around—useful for everything from sports like golf and baseball to picking up your kids and carrying groceries. It also takes a beating in workouts where you’re placing a lot of weight overhead (think push presses). The 90-90 works to strengthen the joints to safeguard against injury.

How to Do It

1. Stand tall, holding a 5- to 10- pound dumbbell in each hand, to start.

2. Raise arms so dumbbells are level with head and elbows are at 90 degrees.

3. Rotating only your shoulders, keeping elbows and wrists in same positions, lower weights forward so forearms are parallel to ground and palms face up.

4. Reverse the movement to return to start.

5. That's 1 rep.

Best Shoulder Exercise for Mass: Farmer’s Walk

Why It Works

We like a good overhead press as much as the next guy for building shoulder mass, but when it comes to the best move for size, we go for the farmer’s walk since it forces you to pull your shoulders back and down. That means you’re guaranteed to be in proper position throughout the movement, which pushes the shoulders, builds core strength, and brings you back into proper alignment after a day likely spent hunched over a screen. Ever see a farmer with hunched-over shoulders? Exactly. Work this in to dedicated shoulder workouts or as part of a full-body routine.

How to Do It

1. Brace your core, hinge at your hips, and pick up the heaviest set of dumbbells you can handle, to start.

2. Squeeze the handles hard and walk with your chest proud and shoulders back.

3. If you don’t have the space to walk in a straight line, walk in a figure-eight pattern.

Best Shoulder Dumbbell Exercise: Dumbbell Raise Complex

Why It Works

The dumbbell lateral raise alone belongs in the conversation for the best shoulder movement with dumbbells. But when we make it a three-pronged complex, we deliver a tremendous shoulder workout in one multi-movement, much like the Arnold press.

How to Do It

1. Hold dumbbells at your sides with palms facing you, to start.

2. Raise the weights up in front of you to shoulder level with thumbs pointing up.

3. Complete 12 to 15 reps, then raise the weights out to your sides at 90 degrees, bending your elbows as you lift.

4. Complete the same number of reps, then switch to a lighter pair of dumbbells.

5. Raise them out to your sides and up to ear level with straight arms and thumbs pointing up.

6. Hold this position for 30 seconds. Squeeze your glutes to help support you.

Best Shoulder Exercises of All Time

Why You Should Trust Me

Pete Williams is a NASM-certified personal trainer who, for more than 20 years, has written about training and performance for Men’s Journal, Men’s Health, Men’s Fitness, and other publications. He’s the author or co-author of a dozen fitness books, including Mark Verstegen’s five-book Core Performance series.