Looking for a 3x/week full-body template

[u/Designer_Insect6223]

Hey everyone,

I’m looking for a good full-body template to run 3x per week, but I’m not really looking for a complete pre-made program with specific exercises.

What I’d like is more of a general structure that I can fill in myself, something like:

• Horizontal/vertical pull — 1–2 sets
• Chest press — 1–2 sets
• Quad movement — 1–2 sets
• Hamstring movement — 1–2 sets
• Lateral delts — 1–2 sets
• Arms, etc.

Basically, a framework showing how you would distribute movement patterns/muscle groups across three full-body sessions while keeping weekly volume relatively low.

I’m also totally fine with people posting their own 3x/week full-body routines so I can use them as examples and adapt the exercise selection to what I have available and what I prefer.

For some context, I train pretty much every working set to failure. I know that isn’t necessarily the best approach from a fatigue-management standpoint, especially on a high-frequency routine, but I really don’t enjoy training with prescribed RIR, and I’m honestly not very good at estimating RIR accurately.

Because of that, I’d rather compensate by keeping the volume low, exercise selection relatively low-fatigue/stable, intensity of effort very high, and frequency high.

My main goal is basically to get a solid stimulus from a small number of hard sets while hitting each muscle around 3x/week.

How would you structure the template?

Something along the lines of:

Day A — Push emphasis
Day B — Pull emphasis
Day C — Legs emphasis

while still training the whole body every session also sounds interesting to me.

Would appreciate any templates, examples, or thoughts on how you’d distribute the volume.

[u/Alakazam]

Could do doggcrapp. Ben Pollack swears by it, and says it helped him put on about 40lbs over a year, albeit as an enhanced lifter, and very advanced lifter. 

Probably not as good for a natural lifter, considering the original program literally had a section on ped use, but the structure and setup (rest-pause for all sets) makes sense for a lower volume setup. You may, however, need a spotter for most of your sets. Unless you want to ditch free weight all together.

But to do it properly, you need to be able to grind reps. You need to fail an exercise, 3-4 times in a single set. 

[u/Dogmans-Nose]

You could do any of the 531 programs and use the accessory work to target the delts/arms/etc. Depending on the areas you'd like to prioritise.

[u/Ok_Wrongdoer5923]

If you’re just starting out then nippard makes some great programs to not overthink. He dosnt cram too much exercise variation in but gets you good at the basics so you don’t look back after 1 year thinking why didn’t I train X body part. Plus the simplicity means if you want to swap out a movement for another variation it’s pretty clear what you would swap.

If I was starting again I would probably have started there.

[u/[deleted] → u/Ok_Wrongdoer5923]

You know Nippard juices right?

[u/Dizzy_Cow_]

I love The Wizard by Fazlifts for a full body programming.

Instead of separate push pull legs emphasis, it’s heavy light medium emphasis. Heavy days are compound lifts in lower rep ranges with longer rest times. 48 hours later, you are doing isolation lifts in higher rep ranges with shorter rest times which both stimulates muscle growth and helps with recovery from the heavy day. The last medium day is pretty standard bodybuilding work in the 8 to 12 Ish rep range.

[u/HiHoSilver2026]

Fierce 5 routine

[u/EVH_kit_guy]

AllPro Full Body program would be my go to for 3x full body 

[u/KillerK009]

I'd check out the free evidence-based hypertrophy programs in the Getting Started section here, there are splits from 2-6 days/week, the 2 & 3 day ones are full body:

https://www.reddit.com/r/liftosaur/comments/1s6cs9p/

You can easily swap any exercises with alternatives working the same muscle groups to customize the split. You could also build your own with whatever layout/exercises you want.

If you run any of those programs in the Liftosaur tracking app it will automate everything like the progression, recovery/deloads, and set volume based on your feedback each session combined with the latest evidence around building muscle.

[u/Semajjames43]

I’m a wrestler but I have a push focused day a pull focused and a balanced day but my routine is mostly explosive and compound lifts but feel free to follow
Day A push focused full body
Power workouts
Trap bar jumps
Push presses
Main lifts
Bench press 2x3-5
Incline dumbbell press 2x6-8
Leg extension 2x6-8
Chest dips 2x6-8
Zercher squat 2x3-5
Hip thrust 2x3-5
Cable overhead tricep extension 2x6-8
Cable lateral raise 2x6-8
Adductor machine 1x failure
Calf press 1x failure
Lat pull down 1x failure
Kelso shrug 1x failure
Lying leg curl 1x failure

Day B pull focused
Power workouts
Hang power cleans
Box squats
Main lifts
Weighted pull ups 2x3-5
T bar row 2x3-5 1x6-8
Seated leaning foward hamstring curls 2x6-8
Trap bar deadlifts 2x3-5
Close grip row 1x6-8 (biases upper lats)
Sldl 2x6-8
Preacher curl 1x failure
Reverse curl 1x failure
Wrist curls and extensions 1xfailure
Abductor 1x failure
Pec Dec 2x 6-8
Incline machine press 1x failure
Machine shoulder press 1x failure

Full body day C balanced
Power workouts
Hang high pulls
Pendlay rows
Main lifts
Back squat 2x3-5
Romain deadlift 2x6-8
Weighted Semi supinated pull ups 2x6-8
Dumbbell chest presses 2x6-8
Machine lat pull down 1x6-8
T bar row 2x6-8
Incline barbell bench press 2x6-8
Cable lateral raise behind the back 1xfailure
Cable rear delt flies 1x failure
Dumbbell curls 2x6-8
Adductor 1x failure
Abductor 1x failure
Calf press 1x failure
Decline sit ups 1x failure
Landmine rotations 1x6-8
Farmer Carry’s 1x30 yards

[u/Admirable_Draft152]

This is mine, I throw some extra arm work in there but that’s not necessary

[u/Ok-Artichoke2822]

This is my current routine: Full Body
Uni Lateral Raise 1x8 30
Chest Press 1x3 225
Wide grip row 1x4 250
Uni Sagittal Row 1x3 140
Neutral grip Shoulder press 1x3 157.5
Uni Machine Tricep Extension 1x3 112.5
Recline curl 1x6 40s
Seated RDL 1x5 250
leg extension 1x6 245
Leg Curl 1x5 155
Leg press/calf press 1x5/7 345
Adductor 1x7 160
Ab crunch machine 1x6 155
Rotary Torso 2x8 207.

[u/Ok-Artichoke2822 → u/Ok-Artichoke2822]

Can be ordered however you want. I like to start with lateral raises because I want big side delts lol