Whether you spend your time between sets doomscrolling or impatiently watching the clock, how long you rest can have a significant impact on your next set.
Longer rest periods are particularly useful when lifting heavy, helping you recover sufficiently to maintain performance across your workout. But if you're smashing out high-rep bodyweight exercises, you don't necessarily need to spend several minutes sitting around between sets.
According to coach Adam Sinicki, aka The Bioneer on YouTube, cutting your rest periods to just 30 to 60 seconds could help you get more from high-rep bodyweight training.
'These short rest periods are critical to getting the very best results with bodyweight or other lighter weights,' says Sinicki. 'I'm talking 30 to 60 seconds maximum.'
Why Take Less Rest for Bodyweight Exercises?
The basic principle is simple: recover less and the next set gets harder sooner.
'Short rest periods mean you will more quickly fatigue the slower-twitch muscle fibre on subsequent sets,' Sinicki says. 'This means you can stimulate the high-threshold motor units much quicker the next time than you otherwise would.'
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He also points to the increased metabolic demand.
'You’re engaging more high-threshold motor units faster, you’re creating more metabolic stress, and you're forcing yourself to send a stronger neural drive much sooner,' says Sinicki.
In practical terms, accumulating fatigue between sets can make a relatively easy bodyweight exercise considerably more challenging without adding any external load.
'If you have less weight available, if you’re going to use your bodyweight, then shorter rest periods can be a great way to increase the intensity without needing to add more weight on,' he says.
That could be particularly useful if you can already perform high numbers of push-ups or bodyweight squats and don't have access to additional weight.
When Should You Take Longer Rest Periods?
That doesn't mean you should start cutting every rest period to 30 seconds.
Sinicki notes that much of the research supporting longer rest periods has involved weights and more traditional strength-training rep ranges. And if your goal is maximum strength, power or mastering advanced calisthenics skills, allowing yourself more time to recover still makes sense.
'If I'm doing handstand training, if I'm doing front lever progressions, then yeah, I'm going to use longer rest periods because I need my nervous system to be fully recovered,' says Sinicki. 'If you're training for explosive leaping into the air, then I’m going to use longer rest periods.'
The same principle applies to heavy strength work: if insufficient recovery means your performance falls off dramatically from set to set, extending your rest periods will allow you to attack the next effort with more quality.
How Long Should You Rest Between Bodyweight Sets?
Ultimately, your rest periods should reflect what you're trying to achieve.
'I think there are benefits to using both types of rest period depending on your goals,' says Sinicki.
For high-rep bodyweight training, 30 to 60 seconds can be a useful way to accumulate fatigue, make lighter exercises more demanding and keep your workouts short.
For heavier strength work, explosive exercises and advanced skills, take longer to ensure you're sufficiently recovered to perform each set well.
'High-repetition bodyweight training with shorter rest periods, you still do gain a lot of strength,' Sinicki says. 'What you’re also getting is loads of hypertrophy, and you're training strength endurance.'
But he doesn't suggest replacing all of your longer rests.
Shorter rest periods are 'not to replace every other type of training you're doing, but just to supplement it, just as something else to try,' he concludes.
And that's probably the most useful way to view them. Don't slash your rests simply to make every workout feel harder. But when you're working with lighter loads or your own bodyweight, cutting them down can be another progression tool when adding more weight isn't an option.
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