When trying to increase lean muscle mass, the science is essentially the same for both males and females. However, the way it is executed can differ between the genders.
To answer your question about how to build lean muscle for females, it depends on a few key factors that will contribute to your overall gains and progress.
Many women are afraid to build muscle because they think they will get bulky in the process. However, depending on the muscle-building strategies you follow, it is entirely possible to build lean muscle without gaining excess fat.
How to Build Lean Muscle for Females: Full Guide
The fundamental principles of building lean muscle mass are tied to workout and nutrition consistency. This means you need to train at least three times a week and follow a healthy, protein-rich diet.
Depending on your fitness goals—whether you aim to eat in a calorie surplus, maintenance, or deficit—you can lose, gain, or maintain your current weight while building lean muscle mass.
The key to achieving this is incorporating weight lifting into your workouts. It’s not necessary to lift extremely heavy weights, like 300 lbs.
Training with weights between 40 to 50 lbs is sufficient to build lean muscle mass, as long as you support your progress with proper nutrition. As you become accustomed to the weights you’re using, you can gradually increase them or continue with what you’re comfortable with.
Now, let’s dive deeper into the most crucial aspects that will contribute to your lean muscle gains and help you achieve your fitness goals.
Workouts
Training consistently—whether you focus on bodyweight, weighted, or cardio exercises—is crucial. Stick with your routine, and as you gradually progress, improve your overall form and athleticism, and begin increasing resistance.
For example, you can increase the weights you train with or add reps for bodyweight exercises, incorporating holds or slowing down movements (e.g., doing push-ups slowly). This increases muscle strain, ultimately contributing to muscle mass and strength gains.
The most effective approach to building lean muscle for women is progressive overload, which means gradually increasing the weights you lift. For example, if you’re doing hip thrusts with a 50 lb weight, you might increase to 70 lbs or more in a week or two as you feel comfortable.
Limiting reps is another key aspect of building lean muscle. For instance, performing 8 reps with 100 lbs is more beneficial than 25 reps with no weight.
Other training methods, such as training to failure, AMRAP (as many reps as possible), supersets, and dropsets, also contribute to muscle growth.
Having a simple yet effective workout program that suits your needs, requirements, and fitness level is essential. If you’re a beginner starting your fitness journey, we recommend downloading our fitness app, Workit, where you can request personalized workout programs and meal plans.
Let’s take a look at the science behind building lean muscle mass and how exercise helps women build muscle.
Muscle Fiber Activation and Hypertrophy
- Types of Hypertrophy: Muscle growth occurs primarily through two types of hypertrophy—myofibrillar and sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, where the former increases the size and number of muscle fibers, and the latter increases the volume of sarcoplasmic fluid in muscle cells.
- Muscle Fiber Recruitment: Strength training activates both slow-twitch (endurance) and fast-twitch (power) muscle fibers. Engaging both fiber types promotes balanced muscle growth.
Progressive Overload
As mentioned, progressive overload is key to muscle growth. Gradually increasing resistance or volume (sets and reps) helps muscles grow.
For beginners, it’s advisable to start with weights you’re comfortable with, aiming to complete at least 6-8 reps and 3 sets at most.
Nutrition
You have probably heard the saying, “You cannot outtrain a bad diet.” While consistent exercise is crucial, you will not see noticeable changes in your physique unless you eat a protein-rich diet.
Protein is the building block for muscle mass. Ideally, you need to eat 0.7 grams of protein per pound of your body weight. So if you weigh 150 lbs, you should be eating 105 grams of quality protein.
Your nutritional choices will determine how well you progress, recover, your injury rates, and overall how exercising makes you feel.
You can think of nutrition as the key to your health and happiness, and you need to be mindful with your choices and limit processed and junk food as much as possible.
As a woman, it’s healthy to have 15-24% body fat. For men, it is mainly recommended to limit carb intake and keep body fat percentage lower, sometimes to single-digit numbers, to achieve the epitome of a lean male physique.
However, for women, it is different, and it’s entirely healthy to have an average body fat of 15-24%. There are multiple reasons for this, so let’s discuss them thoroughly.
Essential Body Fat
- Reproductive Functions: Essential fat plays a key role in hormonal balance, menstrual cycle regulation, and fertility. Generally, women require more essential body fat to sustain their reproductive health.
- Hormone Production: Fat cells contribute to the production and regulation of estrogen, one of the most important female hormones. Estrogen is key to maintaining healthy reproductive functions and bone health.
Health Implications
- Menstrual Health: In females, it is quite common to experience amenorrhea (the absence of menstruation) when the body fat percentage is too low. This can lead to poor bone density and infertility.
- Bone Density: Low estrogen levels—which can be a side effect of low body fat percentage—can lead to osteoporosis (weak and fragile bones) over time.
- Energy Reserves: Having adequate amounts of body fat is essential for a healthy pregnancy and breastfeeding.
Physiological Differences
- Body Composition: Women naturally have a higher body fat percentage than men. This is a normal aspect of female physiology.
- Metabolic Functions: In females, an adequate amount of body fat supports metabolic processes.
It is healthy for females to generally have a body fat percentage between 15-25% as it supports their overall health, essential bodily functions, hormonal balance, and reproductive health.
As a woman who is actively involved or plans to get involved in fitness, it’s essential to approach fitness and nutrition with these factors in mind.
How to Build Lean Muscle Mass for Females
Considering the objective is to build lean muscle without gaining any extra fat, the first step to achieving this goal is to understand your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) and TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure).
The easiest way to calculate both is to download the Workit app, where these tools are freely available. Alternatively, you can search the web for working versions; however, not all are reliable and built on fundamental principles.
Knowing your daily energy expenditure is essential, as this is crucial to understanding how many calories you need to eat in a day. Based on this information, you will design your entire nutrition program so that you don’t exceed the daily maintenance limit.
For example, if your TDEE is 1,800 calories, you will need to eat 1,800 calories. We would recommend staying in a slight calorie surplus, as this will enhance your muscle-building process, and you can always do a cut later to shed those extra pounds in a short amount of time. Lift weights to build lean muscle and not gain any extra fat during the process.
The only thing you need to be aware of is that muscles grow more slowly when staying in maintenance or a calorie deficit. The best and fastest way to build muscle is to stay in a calorie surplus, meaning you eat slightly above your daily maintenance. You can also do a dirty bulk, but we don’t advise doing it, as it can quickly get out of hand.
If you eat an extra 200-300 calories a day and train consistently during the week, in a month or two you will see significant progress. It is likely that you will gain some unwanted fat during the process, but you can do a very simple cut by recalculating your TDEE through the Workit app and adjusting your goals accordingly.
As we already mentioned, the key to achieving your fitness goals—in this particular case—is to exercise regularly. Depending on your flexibility, whether you are super strict about staying in calorie maintenance or can allow yourself a slight calorie surplus, you will achieve your goals in no time and build your dream body with amazing aesthetics.
Remember: The key to building muscle in the fastest and most effective way is to eat in a calorie surplus, and even a slight surplus is enough to achieve outstanding results.
The Best Foods to Build Lean Muscle for Women
It’s essential to consume the right foods when trying to build muscle. Protein is the building block of muscle mass, so it’s crucial that your nutrition centers on consuming enough protein.
As we already mentioned, it is advisable to consume 0.7 grams of protein per 1 lb of body weight, as this ensures you have adequate amounts of protein in your body to support healthy muscle growth.
The primary sources of lean protein are red meat, poultry, and fish. Of course, your plate should be balanced and include healthy amounts of fats and carbohydrates.
We would advise you to focus particularly on beef, as it is rich in creatine. Creatine is proven to be one of the best compounds to support muscle building, maximize strength, and enhance recovery.
If you want to learn more about creatine, read our articles that cover creatine’s advantages and disadvantages in depth. Also, remember that creatine is one of the most effective supplements you can take to fuel your fitness journey and reach the next level.
Menstrual Cycle and Lean Muscle Building
Understanding the menstrual cycle’s impact on lean muscle building, exercise intensity, energy levels, and overall well-being can help women optimize their training and nutrition strategies.
Since the menstrual cycle is characterized by hormonal fluctuations, it can affect overall performance and muscle recovery. It’s essential to allow your body to rest if you experience any difficulties.
During the menstrual phase (days 1-5), hormones like estrogen and progesterone are relatively low, making it highly likely you’ll experience fatigue, cramps, and low energy levels.
If your body is signaling a need for rest, listen and act accordingly. If you feel energetic, engaging in light exercise, such as walking, can be a great activity to boost your mood, improve energy levels, and alleviate discomfort. Staying well-hydrated and consuming iron-rich foods can help offset potential iron loss.
The follicular phase (days 3-13) sees a spike in estrogen, peaking just before ovulation. During this time, you may notice higher energy levels, an improved mood, and enhanced strength. Remember that estrogen also has anabolic effects, as it promotes muscle growth and reduces muscle damage and inflammation through muscle protein synthesis.
This is an ideal time to lift weights, engage in HIIT exercises, and focus on strength training. Be sure to supplement your body with adequate protein to support muscle synthesis and try to maximize your efforts during exercise to improve muscle hypertrophy.
Up until the luteal phase (days 15-28), women may experience peak form, maximizing output and making significant progress in their workouts.
As the luteal phase begins, progesterone levels rise while estrogen decreases. It’s common to experience bloating, fatigue, and mood swings during this time. Progesterone generally has catabolic effects, which can break down muscle protein and may cause fluid retention.
If you feel less than 100% during this phase, consider adjusting your training intensity by slightly decreasing weights, or if you’re focusing on HIIT, give yourself more rest time between sets.
Prioritize healthy, whole foods, ensure you’re getting quality sleep, and don’t hesitate to treat yourself if you find yourself craving something sweet.
Staying active is crucial for maximizing lean muscle building. Even if you need to lower your workout intensity occasionally, you will still see excellent gains as long as you remain consistent with exercise and eat well.
Also, remember that magnesium-rich foods like anchovies, crab meat, oysters, canned tuna, trout, turkey, and chicken breast can help reduce PMS symptoms and support muscle function.
The menstrual cycle indeed influences the lean muscle-building process due to hormonal fluctuations. As your energy levels fluctuate, impacting muscle recovery and overall performance, it may take more effort compared to men to build the same amount of muscle.
However, don’t get discouraged, as you can build an amazing physique and achieve all of your fitness goals, despite any roadblocks you may encounter along the way.
The Best Workouts to Build Lean Muscle Mass
It’s difficult to recommend the best workouts, as each individual needs a personalized approach to create a workout program that suits them perfectly.
The best advice would be to recommend the Workit app, which will create a tailored workout plan to help you progress and build lean muscle effectively.
Each Workit program is specifically designed for you and incorporates progressive overload so that you can maximize your gains in the shortest time possible.
The only general recommendation we offer for the best workout to build lean muscle mass is to start with bodyweight exercises as a beginner. Exercises like squats, push-ups (or assisted push-ups), planks, and mountain climbers are great starting points. As you progress, incorporating weighted exercises will further enhance your gains and performance.
Here’s a simple 3-day workout split designed for beginners to build lean muscle mass with light weights:
Day | Exercise | Sets | Reps | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
Day 1 | Lower Body (Legs & Glutes) | |||
Bodyweight Squats | 3 | 12-15 | Keep core tight; use dumbbells as you progress | |
Glute Bridges | 3 | 12-15 | Add a weight on hips for extra resistance | |
Lunges (Bodyweight or Dumbbell) | 3 | 10 each leg | Step forward, keeping knee aligned over ankle | |
Calf Raises | 3 | 15-20 | Use a step or platform for range of motion | |
Clamshells (Resistance Band) | 3 | 12-15 per side | Use a light band around thighs for added resistance | |
Day 2 | Upper Body (Arms & Shoulders) | |||
Dumbbell Shoulder Press | 3 | 12-15 | Start with light weights; press up, not forward | |
Dumbbell Bicep Curls | 3 | 12-15 | Keep elbows close to body | |
Dumbbell Tricep Extensions | 3 | 12-15 | Use both hands to support one dumbbell overhead | |
Dumbbell Lateral Raises | 3 | 10-12 | Lift weights to shoulder height only | |
Push-Ups (or Knee Push-Ups) | 3 | 8-12 | Aim for controlled reps; lower knees if needed | |
Day 3 | Full Body & Core | |||
Deadlifts (Light Dumbbells) | 3 | 12-15 | Hinge at hips, keep back straight | |
Dumbbell Rows | 3 | 10-12 per side | Keep elbow close, pulling towards hip | |
Russian Twists (Bodyweight) | 3 | 15-20 per side | Hold light weight or no weight for control | |
Plank | 3 | 20-30 seconds | Engage core and avoid sagging hips | |
Bicycle Crunches | 3 | 12-15 per side | Rotate upper body, bringing opposite elbow to knee |
When searching for the right workout program, be open to testing and experimenting. Give yourself time to find the workouts you enjoy, and stick with the ones that feel right for you.
Conclusion
We’ve provided numerous tips and recommendations, along with things to be mindful of.
The key to building lean muscle and achieving your fitness goals is consistency and discipline. As long as you stay consistent with your workouts and nutrition, you will see progress and improvement.
Even if you only do bodyweight exercises, you will get toned and build lean muscle. However, for the best results, it’s advisable to lift weights (even a little goes a long way) and eat in a slight calorie surplus.
As a woman, it may be a bit harder to build muscle compared to men (since men have more testosterone), but with hard work and dedication, you can build a superb physique that looks strong, beautiful, and athletic.