---
title: "Lat exercises without equipment"
description: "Without a bar there is no real way to load the lats. See what is actually left: stretches, scapular control and extension work on the mat."
locale: en
url: "https://hi.fitness/exercises/muscles/lats/bodyweight"
count: 10
type: combo
muscle: LATS
equipment: BODYWEIGHT
---

# Lat exercises without equipment

The lats pull the arm down and in toward the torso. To load them you need something that pushes
back in that direction - a bar, a cable, or a band anchored high. Standing on the floor there is
nothing to pull against, so the no-equipment list looks the way it looks: stretches, scapular
control and extension work on the mat.

Treat it as a supplement, not as a back workout. If you are looking for the movement that will
actually build your lats, you will find it in the atlas under the pull-up bar, the cable, the
resistance band or suspension straps. What follows is what makes sense on a day without any of
them.

## What is actually on this list?

Three different groups. The first is stretching: on all fours, lying on your side, standing with a
torso twist, and braced against a bench. The second is scapular control, meaning scapular push-ups,
seated shoulder blade squeezes and shoulder circles - small-range movements where you learn where
your shoulder blade is and what it can do without help from the arm. The third is extension work on
the mat: both superman versions and push-ups done lying on your back.

Only one exercise in the set is named outright after the lats. In the kneeling stretch you reach one
arm out in front of you, bend the other elbow and drop your chest toward the floor. The description
adds a condition that is easy to skip past: the reaching arm has to be straight all the way, because
only then does the stretch reach the lats instead of stopping at the shoulder.

The rest is about the back more broadly than this one muscle, and it shows up here because the lats
take some part in it. That is more honest than pretending you are looking at a training plan.

## What is it good for?

Three things. As a warm-up before you pull, because shoulder circles and scapular push-ups wake the
shoulder joint up in the range it is about to work in. As something sensible on a day without
equipment, when the alternative is nothing at all. And as help for people whose stiff lats limit
reaching overhead - this is the muscle that closes the last few degrees of that movement.

For the stretches the catalog gives 15 to 30 seconds in position and calm breathing, and on the
torso twist it adds not to force it and to rotate only as far as your flexibility allows. The
supermans and the push-ups lying on your back are the only movements here where you lift anything at
all, and even there the load is the weight of your own arms and legs.

If you want to go further than this, the cheapest step is not another set on the mat but a
resistance band anchored overhead, or a pull-up bar in a doorway. Both give the lats resistance in
the direction they actually work, and both have their own lists in the atlas.

## Common mistakes

- **Looking for a back workout here** - Nothing on this list gives the lats resistance they actually have to fight. Ten minutes of stretching and arm circles will not replace one set of pull-ups, however tired you feel afterward.
- **Bending your elbows on scapular push-ups** - The description says it outright: without bending the elbows. The whole movement is squeezing your shoulder blades together and spreading them apart in a plank position. Once the elbows start working it turns into a short push-up, and the shoulder blades stop moving.
- **A superman pulled from the low back** - The cues on both versions repeat the same thing: brace your midsection, no excessive arching of the lower back. Lifting the arm and leg higher does not make the exercise better, it just moves it lower, into the lumbar spine.

## All Lat exercises without equipment

- [Superman Pulls](https://hi.fitness/exercises/superman-pulls) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Alternate Superman](https://hi.fitness/exercises/alternate-superman) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Scapula Push Up](https://hi.fitness/exercises/scapula-push-up) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Supine Push Up](https://hi.fitness/exercises/supine-push-up) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Shoulder Circle](https://hi.fitness/exercises/shoulder-circle) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Dynamic Back Stretch](https://hi.fitness/exercises/dynamic-back-stretch) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Upper Back Stretch](https://hi.fitness/exercises/upper-back-stretch) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Middle Back Rotation Stretch](https://hi.fitness/exercises/middle-back-rotation-stretch) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Backward Forward Turn to Side Neck Stretch](https://hi.fitness/exercises/backward-forward-turn-to-side-neck-stretch) - Lats · Bodyweight
- [Extension and Inclination Neck Stretch](https://hi.fitness/exercises/extension-and-inclination-neck-stretch) - Lats · Bodyweight