Key Takeaways
- Dumbbell back exercises allow you to work your back with greater freedom of motion and range of motion.
- They help you bring up a weak side.
- Variations on the row work the lats and upper back.
- There are ways to make light dumbbells more challenging.
- The best shoes for dumbbell back workouts include the NOBULL Outwork, Recs, and Drive.
If you used to train at a well-equipped gym and now find yourself working out in your garage, or you just started on your fitness journey by Googling "dumbbell back exercises," rest assured that a few dumbbells and a bench will get the job done. That holds whether your goal is more muscle, strength, or to restore balance to your body after years of slouching or lopsided upper-body training. We did the research and consulted an expert to bring you the best back exercises with dumbbells; we also included a sample workout that brings those moves together.
Benefits Of Dumbbell Back Exercises
Unlike barbells, dumbbells won't let you load up hundreds of pounds that look great on an Instagram highlight reel, but they offer several unique advantages.
Freedom of motion
Using a barbell or machine fixes your hands in place. As a result, the range of motion and the path your body moves is determined by the implement. With dumbbells, your hands are free to move however you need them to move. Not having to conform to a pre-set movement pattern can help you work around existing aches and pains and avoid injury. Additionally, you'll call on numerous little muscles that help stabilize your body during the exercise. This is an effect you don't get to the same degree from a barbell, and it can help make you stronger on barbell training when and if you return to it.
More range of motion
Try rowing with a barbell and you'll find that you can't quite get your shoulders and arms retracted as far as possible at the top of the movement. The bar stops at your belly. With dumbbells, you can manage an extra inch or so of range, increasing the amount of muscle stimulated.
Targeting weak points
With a barbell row or chinup, both sides of the back have to work at the same time, and, because we all have a little asymmetry side to side, your stronger half will take over some of the work for the weaker one. Consequently, that weak side will never come up to par. Unilateral dumbbell back exercises like the one-arm row are a nice complement to bilateral work, helping you focus on the weaker side to even things out over time.
What Are The Muscles Of The Back, And How Do You Work Them With Dumbbells?
When lifters say they're in the gym to train "back," they're usually referring to the lats—the big sheets of muscle that spread like wings along the sides of your spine—and several muscles of the middle and upper back (traps, rhomboids, teres major). You can certainly include the spinal erectors of the lower back in a back workout as well. From top to bottom, here are the major back muscles and their functions.
Trapezius ("traps"):
Runs from the base of your skull down to the middle of your spine and attaches to the shoulder blade, acromion, and clavicle.
The traps shrug and depress your shoulders, rotate your shoulder blades upward, and retract your shoulder blades.
Rhomboids:
Run from the vertebrae near the top of your spine to your shoulder blades.
They work to elevate your shoulder blades and retract them.
Teres major:
Starts at the bottom of your shoulder blades and connects near the top of your upper arm (humerus).
The teres major helps rotate your arm inward and behind you.
Latissimus dorsi ("lats"):
Originates at the lower middle and bottom of the spine and attaches at the upper-arm bone under the shoulder.
The lats pull your arms downward, help rotate them in toward your body, and pull them behind you.
Spinal erectors:
Several muscles that start at the bottom of the spine and connect at different points up your back.
They all serve to extend and straighten the spine, helping you keep good posture.
Training the back will invariably involve other muscles that assist the movements you're doing. These include the rear deltoids, biceps, and various gripping muscles of the forearms. Your core muscles will kick in as well, particularly if you're doing a movement that requires them to brace your trunk while you do it, such as a renegade row.
Most of these muscles can be targeted very effectively with dumbbells using a few variations of one basic movement: the row. You can mimic pullup/lat pulldown movements with a dumbbell pullover as well.
What Back Exercises Can I Do With Dumbbells?
Here's a NOBULL list of the best dumbbell back exercises, no matter what your training goal or experience level. Unless otherwise noted, choose a weight that allows you about five reps with one or two in reserve (i.e., do a set of five but be capable of six or seven; leave a rep or two off). Each time you repeat the exercise in your workout, add a rep until you can do 10 reps. At that point, increase the weight by a few pounds and start the process over with five reps again. Perform 2–3 sets per exercise.
Best Latissimus Dorsi Exercises With Dumbbells
1. One-Arm Dumbbell Row
Primary benefit: strength, muscle size
Target muscles: lats, upper back, middle back
Sometimes called a three-point dumbbell row, this version of the one-arm row is very stable, allowing you to use the heaviest possible weight and get the greatest range of motion—two big factors in building a big, strong back.
Step 1. Grasp a dumbbell in one hand and rest your opposite hand and knee on a bench for support. Keep a long spine from your head to your pelvis and square your shoulders to the floor.
Step 2. Row the dumbbell to your hip, drawing your shoulder back and downward as you pull. Your elbow should not rise higher than your back. Lower your arm under control. Complete your reps, rest, and then repeat on the other side.
"Keep your shoulders level," says Jonny Catanzano, an IFBB pro bodybuilder and trainer in Austin, TX (@jonnyelgato_ifbbpro on Instagram), so you avoid twisting your torso to lift the weight, which brings other muscles into play and relieves the lats of tension. Also, "think about moving your shoulder blade to do the row motion," says Catanzano, as opposed to curling the weight up with your arm.
2. Dumbbell Pullover
Primary benefit: muscle size
Target muscles: lats, lower chest, triceps
The pullover with a dumbbell mimics the kind of motion you perform in a pullup/pulldown exercise without your needing a bar to hang from or a cable. The lower fibers of your pec muscles help a lot on this one, as does the inner, long head of your triceps, so it's a good move to include in a chest and back or upper-body day where you want to be efficient and work all the big upper-body muscles together.
Step 1. Hold a dumbbell by one of its bell ends and lie back on a flat bench with your upper back supported and perpendicular to the bench. Press the dumbbell up and hold it directly over your chest with your elbows pointing forward in front of you. Allow your hips to lower near the floor so you feel a stretch on your lats. Brace your core.
Step 2. Keeping your elbows as straight as possible and pointing forward, lower your arms back and behind you until you feel an even stronger stretch in your lats.
Step 3. Pull the weight back up and over your chest.
Best Upper-Back Exercises With Dumbbells
3. Chest-Supported Dumbbell Row
Primary benefit: muscle size
Target muscles: upper back, lats
Lying on a bench makes the exercise very stable and isolated, so you can really focus on working your back. You can even get extra range of motion that you can't get safely on any kind of standing, unsupported row. Be sure to allow your shoulder blades to spread at the bottom of the movement to stretch your muscles under load.
The chest-supported row also makes it hard to bounce your torso and cheat the weight up, as many people are apt to do on bent-over rows (with a barbell or dumbbells). Furthermore, it's a great option for people with lower-back pain who can't do bent rows but still want to train hard and heavy. Performing the row with your elbows out wide, as described below, emphasizes the muscles of the upper and middle back, but you can also do a row with your elbows close to your sides if you want to make it more of a lat exercise.
Step 1. Set an adjustable bench to a 30- to 45-degree angle—just high enough so that your hands don't touch the floor at the bottom of the row. Grasp a pair of dumbbells and straddle the bench, resting your chest and stomach on the pad. Let your arms hang.
Step 2. Allow your shoulder blades to spread apart so you feel a stretch in your upper back.
Step 3. As you begin the row, drive your shoulder blades back together and downward. Think "proud chest," and imagine squeezing a pencil between your shoulder blades at the top of the movement. Row the weights while flaring your elbows outward 45 to 60 degrees.
Step 4. Lower the weights under control and let your shoulders spread apart again.
4. Dumbbell Farmer's Walk
Primary benefit: grip strength
Target muscles: grip, traps, core
The farmer's walk is simple to do and works everything you've got. There are many ways to implement it. If you have access to heavy dumbbells, go as heavy as you can and walk as far as you can—you'll build a bear-like grip. If you only have lighter weights, go for distance and take short rest periods to train muscle endurance.
Another option is to make it a posture exercise: stand tall and take slow, methodical steps to test your ability to keep good alignment under load. This kind of training builds the stability to reduce injury risk. In any variation of the farmer's walk you choose, you're bound to feel your traps, forearms, and upper back burning.
Step 1. Pick up some dumbbells. If they're heavy, you may want to position one at a time on a bench or other elevated surface so you don't have to lift both at once and risk rounding your lower back, which can be dangerous.
Step 2. Draw your shoulders back, retract your neck so it's in line with your shoulders, and push your chest out. Think: stand tall and proud. Keeping this posture, go for a walk holding the dumbbells at your sides.
5. Dumbbell Y-Raise
Primary benefit: shoulder health, posture
Target muscles: lower traps
The Y-raise isn't going to build big muscles by itself, but it can help you build big muscles down the line without wrecking your body in the process, and it can help offset the effects of digital devices on your posture. People who sit at desks in front of computers all day, or hunch over a cell phone for extended periods (i.e., YOU) tend to have weak upper backs and rounded shoulders. If you do a lot of chest work, you can make the imbalance worse. The Y-raise is an exercise popular with physical therapists for strengthening the lower trapezius, which helps to stabilize the shoulder blades, protecting them from injury.
A Korean study showed that subjects with rounded shoulders who focused on lower-trap strengthening reduced neck pain while improving muscle function and shoulder blade position.
Step 1. Set a bench to a 45-degree angle and lie on it, chest down. Hold a light dumbbell in each hand, and brace your core.
Step 2. Raise your arms out in front of you on an angle so your body forms a Y shape. Hold the top for a second or two. You should feel the tension in the middle of your back, and if you don't, make sure you're not going too heavy or arching your back.
Don't go heavy on these. Do sets of 8–12 reps.
6. Dumbbell Upright Row
Primary benefit: muscle size, strength
Target muscles: traps, deltoids
Upright rows are usually done with a barbell, and they're a risky move for many people. Raising your elbows high with your arms rotated inward can put a lot of pressure on the shoulder joints, leading to injury over time. Switch to dumbbells, however, and the move becomes much safer, as well as a good way to blast both the upper back and the sides of the shoulders. The freedom of motion the dumbbells provide allows your arms to find a range that works for them.
Step 1. Hold a dumbbell in each hand and stand tall.
Step 2. Raise your arms up and row them backward until your upper arms are parallel to the floor, or a little below parallel. You'll know you're at the end of your range of motion when you feel your upper back is fully contracted. Your wrists should end up aligned with your upper arms—not hanging beneath them.
Best Lower-Back Exercises With Dumbbells
7. Dumbbell RDL
Primary benefit: lower-body strength
Target muscles: glutes, hamstrings, spinal erectors
The Romanian deadlift is mainly a lower-body movement, but if you want to include some lower-back work in your dumbbell back workouts, it's a great move to add in. The spinal erectors have to stabilize your trunk while you take your glutes and hamstrings through a big range of motion.
Step 1. Hold a dumbbell in each hand and stand tall with your feet hip-width apart, toes pointing forward.
Step 2. Unlock your knees and push your hips straight back, allowing your torso to lower toward the floor. Keep your core braced to protect your lower back and make sure you're bending at the hips, not the waist. Your spine should stay straight the whole time, from head to tailbone.
Stop when you can't push your hips back any further with bent knees.
Step 3. Extend your hips to stand tall again.
8. Renegade Row
Primary benefit: core endurance
Target muscles: full body
If you like exercises that challenge everything at once, or you work out at home with only very light dumbbells available to you, the renegade row has to be in your arsenal. Basically a dumbbell row done while holding a plank position, it challenges your core muscles while working your back, and it doesn't require heavy dumbbells to get results.
"The renegade row works the internal and external obliques to prevent rotation," says Catanzano. Your body will want to twist toward the side that's rowing, and it's your job to stop it. Remember that the core includes your spinal erectors and other deep lower-back muscles, and while you may not feel them like you feel your traps during farmer's walks, rest assured that they're working.
Step 1. Get into a pushup position, resting your hands on a pair of dumbbells (kettlebells work great too). Place your feet as wide apart as is comfortable. A narrower stance will make the exercise harder; a wider foot placement will make it easier. Take a deep breath into your belly and brace your core.
Step 2. Lean your weight to your right side, pushing that hand into the floor. Your left side will feel lighter. Now row the left-hand weight to your side, but avoid twisting your hips or shoulders. Lower the weight and repeat on the other side.
You can add a pushup to the renegade row if you want to get some chest and triceps work in and make it a true full-body exercise. Alternate pushups between rows.
How To Do Back Exercises With Dumbbells (Or Kettlebells)
We should mention that there's no reason you can't use kettlebells, if you have them available, for all the exercises listed above. A kettlebell's weight is offset from its handle, and that makes it a little harder to control than a dumbbell, so the challenge to your grip and your core strength is greater.
In either case, the weight of the dumbbells or kettlebells you're working with will determine how best to set up your workouts. If you have a range of weights, including some really heavy pairs, then do as we suggested above and perform most of your sets in the 5–10 rep range (2–3 sets total is good for one exercise).
If you have very light dumbbells that won't provide a challenge in lower rep ranges, you can try one of these options where applicable.
Do more reps.
Ten reps may feel easy but 15–20 might be hard, so do as many reps as you need to get close to failure—within a rep or two of where you feel you can't lift the weight anymore with good form.
Slow it down.
Take two or three seconds to lower the weight on every rep. You can also pause for a second or two when your back is fully contracted. These techniques can make light weights feel a lot heavier, and they force you to really dial in your form to do the exercise perfectly.
Try 1.5 reps.
Do a full rep, and then do a half rep in the hardest position of the exercise. For example, on the one-arm dumbbell row, row the weight up, come down halfway, and then row the dumbbell up again. Lower your arm completely. That's one 1.5 rep.
On the dumbbell pullover, lower the weight behind your head, lift it back up halfway, then go down again and come all the way up.
This approach will also require you to perform your reps strictly and will make light weights much more challenging.
At-Home Back Workout With Dumbbells
Here's a workout you can do at home with just some dumbbells and a bench. It trains the whole back but really the entire body as well, including some prehab (injury prevention) work for the shoulders and a conditioning finisher with the farmer's walk.
1. One-Arm Dumbbell Row
Sets: 2 Reps: 5–10 (each side)
2. Dumbbell RDL
Sets: 2 Reps: 5–10
3. Renegade Row (With Pushup)
Sets: 2 Reps: 5–10 (each side)
4. Y-Raise
Sets: 2 Reps: 8–12
5. Farmer's Walk
Sets: 2 Reps: Walk as far as possible
What Shoes Do I Need For Dumbbell Back Workouts?
Proper training shoes make you feel more stable on your exercises and can help you lift more weight safely. The Outwork is NOBULL's most stable training shoe, placing your foot low to the ground so you can push into the floor and transfer force effectively. It has an extremely durable upper and good traction, which are nice features if you work out in a messy garage or basement (or you want to take on more athletic movements like the farmer's walk).
A lower-priced option that offers much of the same stability as the Outwork is the NOBULL Recs. It's also a little more stylish and meant to be worn outside the gym; it's a great all-around shoe that you could easily put on for a morning workout and leave on the rest of the day.
We'll also recommend the NOBULL Drive. It's very breathable (again, a nice feature if you train in a hot, stuffy room) and offers more cushioning than the Outwork or Recs, making it a hybrid shoe that's intended for lifting and cardio. If you want to do a dumbbell back workout and finish out your session with some sprints on a treadmill or around the block, Drive is the best choice.
Read more about what to look for in training shoes in our "Expert's Guide To Gym Shoes."
