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Upper Body Workout for Women: A 2-Day Gym Plan

Upper body days are the ones most women skip. They're also where strength shows up in everyday life: carrying shopping, lifting a suitcase into the overhead bin, holding a plank without your shoulders shaking.

Updated October 17, 2026 · 6 min read · By the HerShape team

This upper body workout for women gives you two gym sessions a week for your back, shoulders, chest and arms. Pair them with two lower-body days, like the ones in our glute workout plan for women, for a full 4-day week.

What a good upper body workout covers

Movement	Main muscles	Examples
Horizontal pull	Mid-back, rear shoulders, biceps	Seated cable row, dumbbell row
Vertical pull	Lats, biceps	Lat pulldown, assisted pull-up
Horizontal push	Chest, front shoulders, triceps	Dumbbell bench press, push-up
Vertical push	Shoulders, triceps	Dumbbell shoulder press
Shoulder isolation	Side and rear shoulders	Lateral raise, face pull
Arms	Biceps, triceps	Curls, pushdowns

Notice there are more pulls than pushes. Rows and pulldowns build the back, which supports posture and balances out all the pressing.

Your upper body workout plan

Do Upper A and Upper B on nonconsecutive days, for example Tuesday and Friday. Each takes about 45-55 minutes. Rest 2 minutes after the first two exercises and 60-90 seconds after the rest.

Effort is written as RIR (reps in reserve): how many more clean reps you could do when you stop. RIR 2 means two good reps left.

Warm-up (5-6 minutes)

Three minutes on a rower or arm bike.
15 band pull-aparts, 10 arm circles each way, 8 incline push-ups.
One or two light sets of your first exercise.

Upper A: chest and row focus

Exercise	Sets x reps	Rest	Effort
Dumbbell bench press	3 x 8-10	2 min	RIR 2-3
Seated cable row	3 x 10-12	2 min	RIR 2
Lat pulldown	3 x 10-12	90 s	RIR 2
Dumbbell lateral raise	3 x 12-15	60 s	RIR 1-2
Cable face pull	2 x 12-15	60 s	RIR 1-2
Dumbbell curl + rope triceps pushdown	2 x 10-12 each	60 s	RIR 1-2

Upper B: pull-up and shoulder focus

Exercise	Sets x reps	Rest	Effort
Assisted pull-up (or lat pulldown)	3 x 6-8	2 min	RIR 2-3
Seated dumbbell shoulder press	3 x 8-10	2 min	RIR 2
One-arm dumbbell row	3 x 10-12 each side	90 s	RIR 2
Incline dumbbell press	2 x 10-12	90 s	RIR 2
Rear-delt fly (cable or dumbbell)	2 x 12-15	60 s	RIR 1-2
Hammer curl + overhead cable triceps extension	2 x 10-12 each	60 s	RIR 1-2

How to progress

Week	Sets	Effort	Goal
1	2 per exercise	RIR 3	Find your working weights
2	As listed	As listed	Add reps
3	Add 1 set to the first exercise each day	As listed	Add reps or weight
4	As listed	Last set of the first exercise can reach RIR 1	Beat your week 2 numbers

After week 4, take an easier week (half the sets, RIR 4), then start again from your new weights. That matches the glute plan, so the two fit together. Use double progression: stay at a weight until every set hits the top of the rep range, then go up by the smallest jump available. Upper-body jumps are small; going from 15 lb to 17.5 lb (or 7 kg to 8 kg) dumbbells is normal. If your gym jumps straight from 15 to 20 lb, add reps first, up to about 15, before moving up.

Push-up progression

Level	Exercise	Move on when you can do
1	Wall push-up	3 x 15
2	Incline push-up, hands on a bench	3 x 12
3	Lower incline, hands on a step or low box	3 x 10
4	Full push-up from the floor	3 x 8, then add reps

Keep your body in a straight line from head to heels and lower until your chest is a fist's height from the surface.

Pull-up progression

Level	Exercise	Move on when you can do
1	Lat pulldown + dumbbell rows	3 x 8 pulldowns with a weight that feels genuinely heavy
2	Machine-assisted or band-assisted pull-up	3 x 8 with less assistance each week
3	Slow negatives: jump up, lower for 3-5 seconds	3 x 5
4	First unassisted pull-up	Then build to sets of 3-5

Pull-ups take most people months. It's a good long-term goal, not a week-one test.

Common mistakes

Using one dumbbell weight for everything. Your row weight is usually much heavier than your lateral raise weight.
Only training arms. Curls and pushdowns are finishers. Rows, pulldowns and presses do most of the work.
Shrugging every rep. Keep your shoulders down and away from your ears on rows, pulldowns and lateral raises.
Swinging the weight. If you have to lean back to finish a curl or raise, the weight is too heavy.
Skipping upper body when short on time. Do the first three exercises of the day; that covers most of the benefit.

How HerShape helps

HerShape builds your full week, upper and lower body, around your goal, equipment and schedule, and adapts it to your progress, life stage and cycle phase. Every exercise has a form video, and your weights are tracked so you know when to go up. With Pro, you can regenerate your plan and ask Coach Sarah (the AI coach) why it changed.

Download HerShape

Your first plan is free. Pro is $9.99 a month or $79.99 a year. See what is included

Frequently asked questions

How often should women train upper body?

Twice a week works well for most people. Two sessions give each muscle enough work to get stronger, with time to recover in between.

Will upper body workouts make me bulky?

Building noticeable size takes years of deliberate training and eating to support it. Most women get stronger and see more definition in their shoulders and arms long before anything they'd call bulky.

What is the best upper body exercise for women?

There's no single best one, but if you only had time for three, a row, a pulldown and a dumbbell press cover the back, shoulders, chest and arms.

I can't do a push-up. Where do I start?

Start with push-ups against a wall or with your hands on a bench, and work through the progression above. Most people move up a level every few weeks.

Can I tone my arms without weights?

Push-up and band progressions can build strength at first. "Toning" is really building some muscle and, for some people, losing some fat; adding weights makes the first part much easier over time.