Plyometrics boost youth jump, sprint and agility

Plyometric training — explosive jumping, bounding and hopping work — is a popular method for building power, speed and agility in adolescent athletes. But earlier reviews looked mainly at single performance domains, individual sports or general youth groups, leaving coaches without a clear overall picture. It has also been unclear whether the effects of plyometric training differ by sex, type of sport, training frequency or how long the intervention runs. This systematic review and meta-analysis set out to answer those questions across jumping, sprinting and agility performance in adolescents.

The authors searched PubMed, Web of Science and Embase from database inception to 1 January 2025, with an updated search on 30 January 2026, for randomised controlled trials in healthy adolescents aged 10-19 years. Sixty-three studies were included. Conventional random-effects models pooled the effects of plyometric training on jumping, sprinting and agility as standardised mean differences with 95% confidence intervals. Because single studies often contribute multiple effect sizes, the team also ran dependency-adjusted analyses using three-level random-effects models with CR2 cluster-robust variance estimation.

Plyometric training significantly improved jump performance (SMD 0.648, 95% CI 0.523-0.772), sprint performance (SMD -0.496, 95% CI -0.609 to -0.383) and agility (SMD -0.659, 95% CI -0.851 to -0.467), all P < 0.001; the negative signs reflect faster times. The dependency-adjusted analyses confirmed the robustness of these findings, with SMDs of 0.613 for jumping, -0.414 for sprinting and -0.595 for agility. Benefits were more consistent with longer intervention durations, with the authors highlighting programmes continued at least 10 weeks. Sex- and sport-specific subgroup findings remained exploratory because of small subgroup sizes and heterogeneity.

This analysis consolidates a large but fragmented literature and confirms what many coaches have long assumed: plyometric work reliably transfers to jumping, sprinting and change-of-direction performance in adolescents. Its methodological care — checking that results held when effect-size dependency was accounted for — adds confidence beyond earlier, narrower reviews. Still, whether boys and girls, or athletes in different sports, respond differently remains genuinely open, as the subgroup data were too thin to say. The authors call for standardised outcome measures, detailed reporting of training dose and adherence, and more female participants in future trials.

For parents, coaches or young athletes, this is a reason to think that structured jump-based training is one of the better-evidenced ways to develop explosive athletic qualities during adolescence, and that patience matters — effects were more consistent when programmes ran for at least 10 weeks. It is population-specific evidence: these trials studied healthy 10-19-year-olds, so the numbers do not automatically transfer to adults. The unanswered subgroup questions mean individual responses will vary, and programme quality and supervision were not the focus here.