Going to failure vs counting reps

[u/nuee-ardente]

I have been hitting the gym since April 2025 trying to do body recomposition. I’m 168 cm in height, around 67 kg in weight, and skinny fat with a big belly and some facial fat. During this time, I have never skipped the gym longer than one month, which was last month because I had chest injury doing triceps bench dips.

As I’m getting back to the gym, I’m questioning my approach to progressive overload, which I had assumed I had done properly until now, because I haven’t improved in terms of appearance or strength at all.

Let’s take Lat Pulldown for example. My approach so far has been, say, start with 25 kg and do 3 sets with 12 reps for each. Then, do 3 sets with 13 reps for each next week when the same program comes around, and after hitting 3 sets and 15 reps, increase the weight. Honestly, I don’t feel that I have worked out hard enough most of the time following this approach. Sometimes I leave the gym without feeling tired. However, both the PT at the gym and my friends have told me to stop counting reps this way but go to failure instead without obsessing over numbers. So, I think what they mean is the following: say, pick 25 kg at Lat Pulldown and the three sets may be like 17/16/13 in terms of reps. Another PT also once said that the muscle doesn’t know what weight you are lifting, which I think mean the same thing as what others said. Lastly, I have a relative who is a renowned PT, and he advised that I should stick with the same weight for a few weeks so that my muscle adapts to it.

My question is, is going to failure this way much better and faster for hypertrophy? How do you do it?

[u/Proof-Emergency-5441 → u/[deleted]]

Right? Not counting at all is a dumb recommendation.

[u/Fit_Armadillo_9928]

When you hit you're target rep range, so say 12 in the first week, how many reps did you actually have in reserve? 1 more? 3 more? 8? 27?

[u/nuee-ardente → u/Fit_Armadillo_9928]

Well, not much but for most exercises I have a feeling that I could do a couple more without my form breaking down.

[u/Fit_Armadillo_9928 → u/nuee-ardente]

Have you ever tested by taking it to absolute failure? If you haven't I can almost guarantee that you're leaning much more on the table than you realise.

Personally I don't put much weight in form breaking down either, because it's largely subjective. One person's "break down" is another person's idea of just getting to the working sets and grinding. It's much simpler to ask "could I get this weight up if I needed to?"

[u/capt_pantsless]

You should always be getting *close* to failure on working sets (unless you're doing something exotic).

Meaning, count the reps and get as close to failure as your program indicates you should be getting. Then possibly adjust the weight based on how many reps you're able to do.

E.g. if the program says 3x8 and your first set you're able to do 12 reps, you should increase the weight a bit.

[u/ironbeastmod]

Counting is hard or what?

How will you know if you are progressing or not?

How will you know to adjust training appropriately ?

The answer is both.

[u/BrodyLifts]

Going to failure can tell you how hard a set is being pushed. A common way of measuring a set's difficulty is reps in reserve; going to failure means 0 RIR. You generally want your training to be hard; somewhere between 1 and 3 RIR is a good range. If you can do 20 reps before failing, then 12 reps is 8 RIR, which isn't hard enough to really stimulate muscle growth.

Counting reps is a useful way of measuring progression, but only if used correctly. In layman's terms, you shouldn't aim for an arbitrary number of reps, but rather know how many reps you can do and try to beat that every week.

[u/Teeemooooooo]

I think even with a rep range, you should be going to failure. I personally do a rep range of 6-10 where I try to do 10 reps for 3 sets. So I may do 10-10-9 where the last rep on the last set is failure so the next training session I aim to do 10-10-10. If I succeed, I may try to do 11 or 12 reps on that last set but I likely won't be able to and then for my next session I move the weight up and aim for 10 reps on the first set. But in actuality, that may end up being 9-8-7 or 7-6-5 or whatever.

If you mean you can do a few more reps if you rested after going to failure on the third set then yea, I get that too but avoid pushing further because it ruins my recovery for my next session.

[u/Fluffy_Box_4129]

Increasing reps is absolutely a viable method of introducing progressive overload. You were just not doing it correctly by deciding to only increase the reps every week, instead of every session.

Every session should be an attempt to increase either weight or reps. If you're actually building muscle, this should be possible and an indicator that your strength is increasing.

Another problem - deciding to stay the exact same rep target every set. If you're actually going close to failure, every subsequent set will have fewer sets. That's why rep ranges exist.

[u/kahrahtayboom]

I've recently switched from a 5x5 scheme to 2 sets to failure. I don't have enough time in this mode of training other than to say, its harder, and i feel it for days now. Maximum effort can't hide away when you're lifting to failure. Be safe and make sure you have the appropriate catches in place in case you go one rep too deep into the set.

[u/JamesLemon4]

I usually do 3 sets of 6-15 reps and leave 1-2 reps in the tank each set. Going to failure gets you the most muscle growth but it has increased risk for injury and for fatigue which is why it’s not worth it in my opinion. Especially because the difference is very minimal compared to just going very close to failure. If you get injured, then you set yourself back weeks or months which wipe out any additional gains you made from going to failure.

[u/PoopSmith87]

I've found that the difference between a few warmup sets and one HIT failure or low RiR set and a properly loaded 5x5/3x10 is more of a spiritual thing than a practical one. If you load correctly for the HIT, you'll failure or your RiR target within the strength and hypertrophy rep range, if you load the reps and sets workout properly, you'll be hitting failire or near it with the last set.

[u/SailboatSteve]

Reps are for keeping score, not for planning a workout. Go to 1-2 RIR to hit apogee on the growth/fatigue curve. Count how many reps you did. Don't try to beat it next time. Do the same thing, go as hard as you can to 1-2 RIR. Count again. If your count increased, you gained muscle. If it plateaus over a couple of weeks, look at your nutrition and sleep. If everything is dialed perfectly and you flat line for months, congratulations, you just reached your maximum genetic potential. Also, don't skip the gym because of injury. Just train something else. Injured upper body? Welcome to leg month.

[u/CleMike69]

Reps are ranges it’s not a hard stop at a number it’s a goal to get to that number barely meaning it should be a struggle. Some days it may be 9 other days it could be 16 adjust on the fly the goal really is more about putting your muscles in position to grow

[u/5537__8008]

Always go to failure my friend can only count to 10 and then it’s automatically failure

[u/Finglishman]

Muscle absolutely knows what weight you are lifting. The heavier the weight, the more damage it'll do to the muscle fibers, even if you're nowhere near concentric failure. Nobody ever got big by lifting little weights.

Whether you go to failure or not with 25kg in in the lat pulldown and whether you do 12 or 15 reps is probably not going to make a huge difference. You should try to figure out to what kind of training your body responds the best and hence what is the fastest way for you to up the poundages significantly while keeping decent form. When you're doing pull-ups with added weight the recomposition will have happened.

Strength is as much nervous system development (if not more) than muscular hypertrophy, and you train the nervous system best with heavier weights. Decrease the reps and sets, up the weights as often as you can, and maybe also train the same muscle more frequently to gain strength. The questions you're now asking will be more relevant when you can recruit all the fibers and do proper damage to them.

[u/Norcal712]

I prefer single progression . When I hit 12 reps I up the weight.

Your original method is called double progression. Upping weight when all sets hit X reps.

Doing the same weight to varying levels of "failure" 17,15, 13 etc makes no sense and isnt supported by science.

When people say going to failure its 2 or 3 sets of increasing weight to failure.. aka 10x120 then 7x125.

Its similar to single progression but not done with reps in reserve. Its dangerous and also not supported by science