Arm Circles | Illustrated Exercise Guide

Primary muscles: Shoulders
Secondary muscles: Upper back
Equipment: No equipment

Arm Circles Instructions

1. Stand straight with your feet shoulder-width apart.
2. Raise and extend your arms to the sides without bending the elbows.
3. Slowly rotate your arms forward, making small circles of about 1 foot in diameter.
4. Complete a set in one direction and then switch, rotating backward.

Proper Form And Breathing Pattern

While doing arm circles engage your core muscles, keep your back and your arms straight and maintain a smooth and deep breathing pattern. Keep your head up and your body in a T formation during the entire exercise.

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Exercise Benefits

Adding arm circles to your workout routine helps to warm up the shoulders, arms, chest, and back. This is a great exercise to incorporate at the beginning of an upper body workout to prevent injuries and prepare your body for strength training.

Arm Circles Demonstration

Sets And Reps

Arm circles are usually performed without weights and each set lasts about 1 minute, 30 seconds in each direction. As you gain strength you can increase the challenge and hold a set of light weights while doing this exercise.

Calories Burned

To calculate the number of calories burned doing arm circles, enter your weight and the duration of the exercise:

Related Upper Body Exercises

Try these other upper body exercises to tone, tighten and sculpt your triceps, biceps, chest, upper back and shoulders:
Bent over lateral raise
Dumbbell bent over row
Dumbbell front raise
Push up

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