Training volume
The total amount of work done, often counted as hard sets per muscle per week.
Training volume is the total quantity of work performed. It can be measured as tonnage (sets × reps × load), but for muscle growth it is most usefully counted as the number of hard sets per muscle group per week.
It matters because volume is a primary driver of hypertrophy: within a sensible range, more hard sets tend to produce more growth, up to a point of diminishing returns and recoverability.
In practice, many lifters grow well on roughly 10–20 hard sets per muscle per week, adjusted to individual recovery.
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Written and reviewed by Mathew Beale — MSc Biotechnology, University of Reading.
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