Written by Garett Reid | NSCA, CSCS, CISSN, M.S.E.S.S
Fact checked by Tyler DiGiovanni, BSBM
FACT CHECKED
Forearms rarely get enough training attention. But considering they're crucial for performing heavy lifts like deadlifts, pull ups, rows, and presses, neglecting your forearms is a huge muscle-building mistake.
And while compound moves do work the forearms, including forearm-specific exercises in your routines can significantly improve your training. Think about it: The stronger your forearms are, the better your grip. And the better your grip, the more ability you have to hold heavy weights, meaning you'll likely see improvements with other lifts.
If you're now onboard with forearm training but unsure what to do, you've come to the right place! I'm about to go over the 7 best dumbbell forearm exercises to build muscle, in addition to training tips, and the benefits of forearm training.
Table of Contents:
- 7 Best Dumbbell Forearm Exercises
- Forearm Anatomy & Functions
- Guidelines For Dumbbell Forearm Workouts
- Importance of Forearm Strength
- Benefits of Forearm Training With Dumbbells
7 Best Dumbbell Forearm Exercises
While there are plenty of dumbbell forearm exercises to choose from to improve your grip strength, utilizing the ones that activate all (or most) of your forearm muscles simultaneously is the smartest training approach.
The best dumbbell forearm exercises are:
- Dumbbell Farmer's Carry
- Dumbbell Reverse Curl
- Dumbbell Hammer Curl
- Dumbbell Finger Curls Behind The Back
- Dumbbell Finger Curls
- Reverse Concentration Curls
- Bench Wrist Curls
These moves will prevent you from spending an hour on forearm training alone. Let's go over how to perform each.
1. Dumbbell Farmer's Carry:
My favorite dumbbell forearm exercise is also called the Farmer's Walk, working the forearms in an isometric hold. And it still activates the majority of the forearm muscles.
If you've ever watched Strongman or followed a strongman workout plan, you'll have seen those monster athletes carry absurd amounts of weight on this exercise. While you don't have to get to that, you should be training heavy so you can carry all of your groceries in one trip from the car!
While light weights and long distances could work for endurance, it's best to prioritize maximal strength and heavy weights for this exercise.
How to do the Farmer’s Carry:
- Since your grip strength and endurance varies daily, it's best to gradually build to your working weight for the day. Pick a distance, perhaps 50 or 100 feet, and carry 50% of your working weight to start the ramp-up process.
- When grabbing the dumbbells, ensure you grab them directly in the middle, so they don't lean forward or backward.
- When holding one dumbbell in each hand, ensure your arms stay straight and your traps stay activated, so your shoulder joint doesn't face undue stress.
- Walk quickly but under control. Ensure you don't sway side to side.
- If your walk includes a turn, slow down before the turn, get to a full stop, and turn completely before accelerating in the other direction.
2. Dumbbell Reverse Curl:
The reverse wrist curl is a great way to add some humility to your dumbbell biceps exercises, especially if you haven't directly trained your forearms before.
Try to keep your elbows tucked in as much as possible because they'll want to flare out to compensate for the difficulty. This exercise tests your isometric strength and endurance for extension and pronation as the dumbbells work with gravity.
How to do the Reverse Curl:
- Start by holding dumbbells at your thighs with your arms straight. Ensure your hands are pronated, so your palms are facing your legs and you're holding the dumbbells with an overhand grip.
- Keeping your elbows tucked, shoulder joint locked in place, and your shoulder blades pulled back, curl the dumbbells up toward your shoulders. It's natural for the elbows to want to flare and your hands to want to supinate a bit. Fight that.
- Stop at the top of the move where you start to lose tension in your biceps and forearms. You may notice this is a bit lower than you typically curl. However, stopping at this point focuses on the maximal contraction and makes the eccentric portion more difficult.
- Slowly lower the weight back down to your thighs and repeat for the desired amount of reps.
3. Dumbbell Hammer Curls:
When it comes to hammer curls vs. bicep curls, hammer curls have a leg up on bicep curls as they activate both the upper arms and forearms at the same time. This exercise can also be done with greater weights than reverse curls, which makes it a better choice for those with strong biceps and weak forearms.
In fact, hammer curls mitigate imbalances between biceps and forearm muscles and create an effective exercise for both muscle groups. Ensure that when you curl the weight up, you bring it up to the center of your chest instead of directly in front of your body. This is easier on your shoulders and allows for more weight to be lifted.
Again, this is another isometric movement for the forearms that focuses on grip strength and endurance rather than flexion or extension. A bicep workout that also works the lower arm muscles? Sign us up!
How to do the Hammer Curl:
- Start with dumbbells at your side, and your palms pointed toward each other with feet shoulder width apart.
- Perform this movement alternatingly: curl one up, back down, and repeat with the other arm.
- Keeping your elbow tucked at your side, curl the dumbbell up toward the center of your body, lifting weights close to your body through the entire range of motion. Squeeze at the peak of the movement and slowly lower the weight back down to your side.
- Repeat for required repetitions.
4. Dumbbell Finger Curls Behind The Back:
This exercise doesn't have a flashy name, but it's one of the best forearm exercises. You'll have to use a lighter weight as the start of the movement requires finger strength more than total grip strength. It will work on the contraction of your grip strength and flexion of your forearm if you utilize the bonus at the peak of the finger curl.
How to do Dumbbell Finger Curls Behind the Back:
- Stand slightly bent in the knees holding free weights behind your back in each hand. Maintain good posture, keeping your core tight. Your palms should be facing behind you with the weights in your fingers instead of your palms.
- Curl your fingers up until the dumbbells reach your palms. At this point, you can roll them back down, or you can add the bonus movement to work forearm flexion as well. Ideal form for this move involves focusing on palms up wrist curl.
- As a bonus, curl your wrists up, trying to get your palms to your elbows and squeeze at the top. Return to the starting position with the dumbbells in the cradle of your fingers. Only your hands and wrists will be moving here.
5. Dumbbell Finger Curls:
Much like the behind-the-back version, these finger curls work the contraction of your grip strength and can work the flexion of your forearm as well, making it a great forearm exercise. And because your wrists are fully extended at the start, you can utilize a full range of motion.
How to do Dumbbell Finger Curls:
- Start by sitting down with your elbows resting on your thighs. Your palms should be facing away from your body with your wrist extended fully. The dumbbells should be resting in the cradle of your fingers.
- Curl your fingers up until you get the dumbbells to your palms. Either lower back down or work the bonus flexion movement.
- To work on forearm flexion with this movement, curl your wrists up until your palms face you before heading back down to the start of the movement.
6. Reverse Concentration Curls:
If it's difficult to keep your elbows tucked and hands pronated during standing reverse curls, these concentration curls can mitigate the issue. Working one arm at a time allows that much more focus on each forearm to improve the results from training.
Reverse wrist curls work on isometric strength and endurance to fight against flexion and supination.
How to do Reverse Concentration Curls:
- Start sitting with your elbow tucked into your inner thigh, and your upper body leaned over. Your shoulder blade will protract slightly to enable this movement. Your arm is inside your leg with your palm facing the leg it is resting against.
- Curl the dumbbell up until the apex of the movement. If you are in the right position, the dumbbell should get very close to your face.
- Slowly lower the weight back down to the starting position and repeat for the desired amount of reps.
7. Bench Wrist Curls:
This movement hits an in-between angle of your forearms that other exercises can't. With this move, your grip determines how your muscles work. If you do this movement with a pronated grip, it becomes a palms down wrist curl that works extension.
If you do this with a supinated grip (palms facing upward), it will work flexion. If you hold a neutral grip with palms facing each other, it will work a different plane between flexion and extension, creating a novel training stimulus to enhance results. This is a great exercise to work into your back and biceps workout.
How to do Bench Wrist Curls:
- Kneel with a flat bench in front of you. Lean forward so your forearms rest on the bench, keep your elbow bent, and your hands are off the other side.
- Using your preferred grip from those listed above, start with the dumbbells at the lowest position possible. For example, if you are doing this pronated, your wrist should be fully flexed downward at the start of the movement.
- Squeeze your hands and curl the dumbbells up to the apex of the flexion/extension.
- Slowly rotate the weight back down and repeat as necessary.
Bonus Move: To hit a forearm angle that's neglected by all other dumbbell forearm exercises, including bench wrist curls, lay down on your back. Keep your elbows bent at 90 degrees and your palms facing each other in a neutral grip. With light dumbbells, press the weights upward, away from your head. Then lower them back down. The range of motion in this exercise and your strength will be low.
Forearm Anatomy & Function
Want to skip the anatomy lesson? Keep scrolling to learn how to include forearm exercises in your workouts!
The major thing to know about your forearm muscles is that they help your hands move up and down and rotate. You can perform two of these movements at once. Roll your hand in a circle, and you'll notice you move between flexion (bending your wrist) and extension (straightening your wrist) and pronation (palms down) and supination (palms up).
When performing forearm exercises, the forearm muscles can be split into the anterior (front) and posterior (rear) regions due to the respective muscles' similar functions.
- Anterior Forearm Muscles: The anterior portion of the forearm is responsible for flexion and pronation, which occurs when the forearm is turned so the palm faces downward.
- Posterior Forearm Muscles: On the flip side, we have the forearm's posterior region responsible for extension and supination, which occurs when the forearm is turned so the palm faces upward, like during spider curls.
Guidelines For Performing Forearm Dumbbell Workouts
A few helpful tips for programming forearm exercises include:
- You can incorporate forearm exercises into any routine.
- Place forearm exercises at the end of your routine. Don't pre-fatigue your forearms by performing your exercises at the beginning of your workout, or your heavy lifts will suffer. You don't want to start your workout with forearm work and then discover you can't hold the barbell at your normal working weight.
- Having your forearms pre-fatigued from being activated through other exercises is a good warmup for your dumbbell forearm exercises.
Sets, Reps, & Frequency For Forearms:
When incorporating forearm exercises into your routine, remember that the forearms respond better to a higher frequency and a variety of rep ranges. When programming forearm exercises, here are a few guidelines:
- Since almost all weight training will activate the forearms somewhat, you can include a few forearm exercises at the end of every workout.
- The typical recommendation for volume for improving strength and hypertrophy is 10 to 20 weekly sets of direct work per muscle group. As for rep ranges, the lower rep ranges build strength, and the higher ones build endurance. It's best to include both to achieve balance.
Example Programming For Forearm Workouts:
An example of how to include forearm training in a four-day split is to perform four sets of forearm exercises at the end of each of your four weekly workouts. Using this pyramid fashion hits all muscle fiber types in a workout and exhausts the forearms enough to cause growth and strength gains. It doesn't have to be complicated!
- Set 1: 4-8 Reps
- Set 2: 8-12 Reps
- Set 3: 12-20 Reps
- Set 4: 20-30 Reps
If you're looking for an entire program to follow along with, here's a great workout you can add to the end of a routine.
IMPORTANCE OF FOREARM STRENGTH
Why add forearm exercises to your workout? Because forearm strength is crucial to many movements that we take for granted in everyday life.
In fact, strong forearms are important because:
- They lead to stronger wrists and hands.
- More forearm strength increases your ability to lift heavier.
- Strong forearms improve bone density.
- It can increase your lifespan.
Let's dig into each of these in more detail.
1. Leads to stronger wrists and hands.
Having strong forearms typically means having strong wrists, hands, and grip strength, which are not only crucial for completing almost all daily tasks (like lugging those grocery bags to the kitchen), but it is also essential for lifting heavier weights in the gym.
This leads us to…
2. More forearm strength increases your ability to lift heavier.
In basic strength training, it's commonly accepted that your lifts are only as strong as their weakest link. Forearms can limit many exercises, like deadlifts, pullups, bent-over rows, and more. If you can lift more weight using lifting straps, it's easy to decipher that your forearms limit your potential on that lift!
Even when your forearms aren't directly activated during an exercise, they can serve the purposes of concurrent activation potentiation, which is a fancy term for primary muscle groups performing better when non-active muscle groups are also contracted. In fact, research shows that concurrent potentiation activation can help improve sports performance1.
3. It improves bone density.
Strength training has the amazing ability to improve bone density, so direct forearm training will improve the surrounding bones and joints.
4. It can increase your lifespan.
It's interesting to note that research shows that those with higher grip strength tend to lower all-cause mortality and risk for severe diseases like heart disease and cancer2. Better bone health improves the potential for heavy lifts, building muscle mass, increased athletic performance, and correlation to better longevity. Forearm strength is quite important!
You can learn even more about the importance of building your forearm muscles in our guide: How To Get Bigger Forearms.
Benefits of Dumbbell Forearm Exercises
Dumbbells are great for building big and strong forearms. Three benefits of forearm dumbbell exercises are:
- Dumbbells are great for correcting imbalances: Forearms tend to be imbalanced, with the dominant hand's forearm being quite strong and more coordinated. Utilizing dumbbells over barbells or machines can help eliminate the imbalance, ensuring even muscle hypertrophy on both sides.
- Dumbbells allow for a greater range of motion: Dumbbells also allow flexion, extension, pronation, and supination, all of which are the primary functions of the forearm muscles. The more your forearms can move, the greater work your forearms muscles can put in.
- They’re versatile: You can go heavy, or you can go light. Dumbbell forearm exercises can equally build strength and muscular endurance. In reality, there isn't a better way to train your forearms directly, especially if you already do heavy barbell lifts like deadlifts and rows that work on your grip strength and endurance isometrically.
Train Your Forearms To Strengthen All Your Lifts
Don't neglect forearm training by assuming they are trained enough during heavy lifts that focus on other muscle groups. Utilizing the exercises in this guide and including them properly in your programming, as suggested, will help improve your grip strength and crossover to many other lifts.
They will also help the aesthetics of your forearms, which is always a good thing. So try out a few of these exercises and incorporate the ones you respond best to regularly to reap the benefits of dumbbell forearm exercises!
Plus, your rolled up sleeves will look significantly more impressive when you're rocking massive, muscular forearms.
Looking for more moves for your forearms? Check out the 10 Best Exercises to Build Crazy Powerful Forearms!
Prepare to maximize your strength with our exclusive 13-week strength training program. 3, 4, and 5 day per week programming options.
References:
- MACE, ALEXIS P., and CHARLES R. ALLEN. “The Effects of Concurrent Activation Potentiation on Bat Swing Velocity of Division II College Softball Athletes.” International Journal of Exercise Science, vol. 13, no. 1, 1 Dec. 2020, pp. 1630–1637, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7745898/. Accessed 13 July 2022.
- Celis-Morales, Carlos A, et al. “Associations of Grip Strength with Cardiovascular, Respiratory, and Cancer Outcomes and All Cause Mortality: Prospective Cohort Study of Half a Million UK Biobank Participants.” BMJ, vol. 361, 8 May 2018, www.bmj.com/content/361/bmj.k1651, 10.1136/bmj.k1651.
Garett Reid
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