Back and Bicep Workout: 3 Sessions With Sets and Reps

How to pair back and biceps

Your back and biceps are the muscles that pull. Every row and pulldown uses your biceps as a secondary muscle, so by the time you reach the curls they have already worked. That makes the pairing save time, but it also changes how you build the session. You do not need as many curls as on a day just for biceps, and your back has to come before your biceps get tired.

A heavy row. The barbell row opens the session because it moves the most weight and needs the most rest.
A pulldown. The reverse grip pulldown, with your palms facing you, is a vertical pull that gives your biceps plenty of work. The regular lat pulldown works too.
A second row. The cable row keeps your torso more stable, which helps when you are already tired.
An exercise with almost no biceps. The straight arm pulldown and the dumbbell pullover load your lats with almost no elbow bend, so they do not tire your biceps further.
A heavy curl and a different one. The EZ bar curl goes first among the curls. After it, the incline dumbbell curl or the hammer curl change your arm position or your grip.

To pick others, see the back exercises and the bicep exercises. To see each muscle on its own, with more options, read the back workout and the bicep workout.

Back and bicep workout at the gym

Back goes first. The exercise done first gains the most strength (Nunes et al., 2021), and tired biceps hold you back on every row and pulldown. For building muscle, the order matters little, so if you want to prioritize biceps for a while you can start with them, knowing you will pull less weight afterward.

Full back and bicep workout: 5 exercises and 16 sets. Each card shows sets × reps and rest.

That is 10 back sets and 6 bicep sets. Do not be surprised if your curl is weaker than on an arms-only day, because it comes after three pulling exercises. Compare each session with the last one of this same workout, not with your best curl from another day.

Dumbbell back and bicep workout

You only need dumbbells and an adjustable bench. With dumbbells there is no true vertical pull, so the pullover takes that spot: it brings your arm from overhead toward your torso and works your lats. It also barely bends your elbow, so your biceps reach the curls less tired.

That is also 10 back sets and 6 bicep sets, so you can alternate it with the gym version without changing your weekly count. If your bench does not incline, swap the incline dumbbell row for the dumbbell bent over row and the incline curl for the dumbbell bicep curl.

Short back and bicep workout

If you are short on time, or just starting out, these 3 exercises cover the main work: a vertical pull, a horizontal pull and a curl. When you are starting out, fewer sets also build muscle (Currier et al., 2023).

It can be tempting to turn it into supersets to finish sooner. Supersets shorten the session with gains similar to traditional sets, but the ones that pair opposite movements, like a press and a row, hold your reps better, and pairing two exercises for the same muscle lowers the total weight you lift (Zhang et al., 2025). A row and a curl look more like that second case, because your biceps work in both. If you are still short on time, do 2 sets per exercise instead.

How many back and bicep sets to do per week

To build muscle, what matters most is how many hard sets each muscle gets per week (Schoenfeld, Ogborn and Krieger, 2017). The ACSM links the greatest hypertrophy to 10 or more sets per muscle per week and sees gains level off around 18 to 20 (Currier et al., 2026). For biceps, no differences were seen between 12 to 20 weekly sets and more than 20 (Baz-Valle et al., 2022). With the sessions in this guide, the count looks like this:

Direct sets per week by how you repeat the sessions
How you repeat it	Back	Biceps	Who it suits
Short, once	6	3	First few weeks
Short, twice	12	6	Beginner or short on time
Full, once	10	6	If back and biceps only get one day
Full and short	16	9	Intermediate
Full, twice	20	12	Advanced, near the point where gains level off

The table counts only curls as bicep sets. Rows and pulldowns also work your biceps, but the sources in this guide do not give a figure for how much they add. If your biceps stop improving, add one curl set per session.

With the same volume, training a muscle once or twice a week gives similar hypertrophy (Schoenfeld, Grgic and Krieger, 2019), so frequency mainly helps you spread the work. In a push pull legs routine, this session is your pull day. The chest and tricep workout and the leg workout complete the rest of the week.

Common back and bicep training mistakes

Starting with curls. Every row and pulldown then suffers, and your back carries most of the sets in this session. Leave curls for the end, unless you are prioritizing biceps for a while.
Adding curls without a limit. After three pulling exercises, five more curls just add fatigue. In this session, two are enough.
Pulling with your arms on rows. If you feel almost everything in your biceps, your back does less and your curls suffer too. Think about driving your elbows back on the row and down on the pulldown.
Going to failure on every pull. Reaching failure does not build more muscle than stopping close to it (Refalo et al., 2023), and here it also leaves you with nothing for the curls. The ACSM suggests ending with 2 or 3 reps in reserve (Currier et al., 2026).
Resting too little. Resting more than 60 seconds has a small benefit, and beyond 90 it barely changes (Singer et al., 2024). On the heavy row, rest as long as you need to repeat your performance. More detail in rest between sets.

How to progress on your back and bicep workout

Log every set. Weight and reps for each exercise. Without that number you do not know what to beat next session.
Add reps first. When you reach the top of the range on every set, raise the weight by the smallest step you can. In trained people, adding weight and adding reps both worked over 8 weeks (Plotkin et al., 2022).
Keep the order. If you do curls first one day, those numbers cannot be compared with last week. Same order, same comparison.
Repeat the same session. Rotating exercises at random or very often can hurt (Kassiano et al., 2022). Change one when you have a reason, like discomfort or a long plateau.

The full rule is in the progressive overload guide, and you can estimate your max on the row or the curl with the 1RM calculator.

Questions

Is it good to train back and biceps on the same day?

Yes, it is a common pairing. Both muscles pull, so one session covers them both and your biceps have already worked by the time you reach the curls.

What goes first, back or biceps?

Back. If you tire your biceps first, you pull less on rows and pulldowns. For building muscle the order matters little, so you can flip it if you are prioritizing biceps for a while.

How many exercises should I do?

Five is enough: 3 for back and 2 for biceps. If you are short on time, 2 for back and 1 for biceps already add up to 9 sets at 3 per exercise.

How many times a week should I do it?

Once or twice. The full version once gives you 10 back sets and 6 bicep sets. Twice gives you 20 and 12, near the point where gains level off.

How do I train the rest of the week?

The usual setup is one push day and one leg day. The chest and tricep workout and the leg workout are ready to copy.

Sources

This guide is for information only and does not replace advice from a health professional.

Back and bicep workout: how to pair them in one session

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