The barbell hip thrust, in which the upper back rests on a bench and a loaded bar is driven upward through the hips, is often presented as the best exercise for the gluteal muscles. The back squat is the traditional alternative. Because the hip thrust needs only a bench and a bar, the question affects what a home gym needs. This article summarises a 2015 electromyography study, a 2020 systematic review of gluteus maximus activation and a 2023 randomised training trial, and separates what muscle activation shows from what training results show. It is about exercise selection, not injury prevention, and it is general information, not medical advice.
Activation: the 2015 comparison
Contreras and colleagues, in the Journal of Applied Biomechanics (2015), had 13 trained women perform estimated 10-repetition maximum sets of the back squat and the barbell hip thrust while surface electromyography (EMG) recorded muscle activity. The hip thrust produced significantly greater mean activity in the upper gluteus maximus (69.5% against 29.4%) and lower gluteus maximus (86.8% against 45.4%), and in the biceps femoris (40.8% against 14.9%). Activity in the vastus lateralis, a quadriceps muscle, did not differ significantly (99.5% against 110%). The authors stated that longitudinal training studies were needed to determine whether the higher activation goes with greater strength, size or performance.
Activation across many exercises: the 2020 review
Neto and colleagues, in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine (2020), reviewed 16 articles that reported gluteus maximus activation as a percentage of maximal voluntary isometric contraction. They classed a long list of loaded exercises as producing very high activation, above 60%, including step-ups and variations, the hex bar deadlift, the traditional barbell hip thrust, the belt squat, the split squat, lunges, the conventional deadlift, the band hip thrust and a modified single-leg squat. The review concluded that several exercises can induce very high gluteus maximus activation, with step-up variations highest, followed by several loaded exercises such as deadlifts, hip thrusts, lunges and squats. The authors offered the results as a guide for selecting exercises.
Two points follow from this. The hip thrust is one of many exercises above the 60% line, so the review does not single it out. And the review measures activation during exercise, not the muscle growth that results from months of training.
Training results: the 2023 trial
Plotkin and colleagues, in Frontiers in Physiology (2023), randomised untrained college-aged participants to hip thrust (18 people) or back squat (16 people) with set volume equated. They trained for nine weeks (15 to 17 supervised sessions), with muscle cross-sectional area measured before and after by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
- Gluteal growth was similar. The estimates modestly favoured the hip thrust for lower, mid and upper gluteal areas, but with appreciable variance, and the confidence intervals spanned zero.
- Thigh growth favoured squats. Quadriceps growth was greater after squatting (3.6 cm², 95% confidence interval 0.7 to 6.4) as was growth in the adductors (2.5 cm²; 1.2 to 3.9).
- Strength followed the exercise trained. Squat three-repetition maximum gains favoured the squat group by 14 kg and hip thrust gains favoured the hip thrust group by 26 kg.
- The deadlift and wall-push tests improved similarly in both groups.
The trial also recorded EMG in the first session. All measured gluteal sites showed greater mean amplitude in the hip thrust set than the squat set, but the authors reported that this did not consistently predict gluteal hypertrophy outcomes. That is the main lesson of the three sources together: higher activation in one session was not a reliable guide to which exercise grew the gluteal muscles more over nine weeks.
Reading the evidence at its actual strength
- The 2015 EMG study used 13 trained women in a single session, so it describes activation, not growth.
- The 2023 trial used untrained young adults over nine weeks, so it cannot be assumed to apply to experienced lifters, other exercise loads or longer periods.
What it means for equipment
If the goal is gluteal size, the 2023 trial gives no basis for saying the hip thrust is superior to the squat, or the reverse, and it found more thigh growth from squats. A lifter with a rack and bar can do either; the guide to power racks, squat stands and half racks compares the kit for squatting. The hip thrust needs a stable bench, and the guide to weight benches explains what stability and pad height mean in practice. The guides to leg and glute equipment and single-limb against two-limb training cover further options such as step-ups and split squats, which the review placed in the very high activation group.
Frequently asked questions
Does higher EMG mean more muscle growth?
Not on this evidence. The 2023 trial’s authors reported that the greater hip thrust EMG did not consistently predict gluteal hypertrophy.
Can the hip thrust replace the squat entirely?
The trial showed different strength and thigh growth outcomes for each exercise, so the two are not interchangeable in every respect.
The bottom line
The barbell hip thrust produced greater gluteus maximus activation than the back squat in a 2015 study, but a 2023 nine-week trial found similar gluteal growth from both exercises, with more quadriceps and adductor growth from squatting. A 2020 review found many exercises reach very high gluteus maximus activation. Exercise choice for glute training can therefore follow available equipment and preference, backed by evidence from untrained young adults over nine weeks and not by activation figures alone.
Sources
- Contreras et al., “A Comparison of Gluteus Maximus, Biceps Femoris, and Vastus Lateralis Electromyographic Activity in the Back Squat and Barbell Hip Thrust Exercises”, Journal of Applied Biomechanics (2015)
- Neto et al., “Gluteus Maximus Activation during Common Strength and Hypertrophy Exercises: A Systematic Review”, Journal of Sports Science and Medicine (2020)
- Plotkin et al., “Hip thrust and back squat training elicit similar gluteus muscle hypertrophy and transfer similarly to the deadlift”, Frontiers in Physiology (2023)