4 Day Workout Split: Upper/Lower Twice
A 4 day workout split, upper and lower twice each week, is the one most people with jobs can actually run. The sessions, the calendar, week-4 progression, and why missing a day does less damage here than on a 6-day week.
The 4 day workout split that works for people with jobs is almost always the same shape: upper, lower, rest, upper, lower, weekend off. Two hits per muscle group. Four trips to the gym. Enough space between the two lowers that you are not squatting on still-sore knees, and enough space between the two uppers that the pressing does not sit on yesterday's rows.
It is less romantic than a 6-day push pull legs routine and less "serious" looking than a 5 day workout split. It is also the one a lot of those people are quietly running by week six, after the extra days have started disappearing. Start here if the last month of your calendar already looks like four days.
Why twice a week, not four body parts
You could spend four days as chest, back, legs, shoulders. Plenty of old cards on gym walls do. You would then train each muscle once a week, which is the same frequency problem the bro split has, with one fewer day to hide it.
Upper/lower twice uses the four days on frequency instead of on themes.
- Chest, shoulders and triceps get two pressing days.
- Back and biceps get two pulling days.
- Quads, hamstrings, glutes and calves get two lower days.
Weekly set counts can sit in a hypertrophy range (about 10 to 16 hard sets per muscle) without any session needing 20 sets of one thing. Each day has a job that is big enough to feel like training and small enough to finish in a lunch hour if you are ruthless with rest and with the extras.
The tradeoff is real, and it is the one to be honest about: you do not get an arms day. You do not get a whole session to bury chest. Isolation lives at the end of an upper day, after the compounds, which is where it belongs anyway. If a themed day is the only thing that gets you through the door, you will hate this split. If getting through the door four times is the actual problem, you will like it.
A week that survives a job
The default calendar is Monday upper, Tuesday lower, Thursday upper, Friday lower. Wednesday and the weekend are rest. Two days on, one off, two on, two off. If you train at 6am, Tuesday lower is the session that collides with a late Monday. Shorten Monday a little if that is your life. Do not slide lower onto Wednesday and then into Thursday.
Why this and not Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday:
- The two lower days want a gap. Back-to-back lowers are how people decide they "can't recover on four days." They cannot recover on consecutive days. That is different.
- The two upper days want a gap for the same reason, though pressing recovers faster than squatting for most people.
- Friday lower is easier to protect than Friday isolation. You will skip an arms day. You are less likely to skip a squat you already planned.
Other layouts that still work:
- Sunday / Monday / Wednesday / Thursday if Friday nights are a write-off and Sunday mornings are free.
- Tuesday / Wednesday / Friday / Saturday for late-week people.
- Upper / lower / upper / lower on four non-consecutive days if shift work makes named weekdays meaningless. Keep the order. Protect a rest day between the two lowers.
Do not run upper/lower/upper/lower on Monday to Thursday with nothing after. You can, for a block, if you are young and well-slept. It compresses all the damage into four days and then asks the weekend to fix it. Fine until it is not. The midweek rest exists for a reason.
The four sessions
Working sets, not warm-ups. Compounds 5 to 8. Accessories 8 to 15. Leave a couple of reps in the tank on the bar work. Isolation can go closer to the end. Each session is also a template you can open in Adiletix instead of rebuilding it from the table.
Upper A (press first)
| Order | Lift | Sets x reps |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barbell bench press | 4 x 5-8 |
| 2 | Barbell bent-over row | 4 x 6-8 |
| 3 | Barbell overhead press | 3 x 6-8 |
| 4 | Pull-up or lat pulldown | 3 x 6-10 |
| 5 | Dumbbell lateral raise | 3 x 12-15 |
| 6 | Barbell curl | 2 x 8-12 |
Lower A (squat first)
| Order | Lift | Sets x reps |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barbell back squat | 4 x 5-8 |
| 2 | Romanian deadlift | 3 x 6-10 |
| 3 | Bulgarian split squat | 3 x 8-12 per side |
| 4 | Lying hamstring curl | 3 x 10-12 |
| 5 | Standing calf raise | 3 x 10-15 |
Upper B (pull first)
| Order | Lift | Sets x reps |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chest-supported row or Pendlay row | 4 x 6-8 |
| 2 | Dumbbell incline press | 3 x 8-12 |
| 3 | Seated cable row or pulldown | 3 x 8-12 |
| 4 | Dumbbell bench or chest dips | 2-3 x 8-12 |
| 5 | Face pull | 3 x 12-15 |
| 6 | Rope pushdown | 2 x 10-12 |
Lower B (hinge first)
| Order | Lift | Sets x reps |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barbell deadlift | 3 x 5 |
| 2 | Front squat or hack squat | 3 x 6-10 |
| 3 | Hip thrust | 3 x 8-12 |
| 4 | Leg extension | 2 x 10-12 |
| 5 | Seated calf raise | 3 x 10-15 |
Deadlift once a week, on Lower B, not on both lowers. Two deadlift days plus two squat days is a 6-day lower-back split wearing a 4-day badge. If deadlifts wreck the next upper, swap them to Friday and keep Thursday upper pulling-light, or replace the deadlift with a Romanian and a row that already exists on upper day.
Rest on the compounds is minutes, not a courtesy pause. How long to rest between sets if you want the ranges. Four days only works if the four days are quality. Rushing a squat because the session "has to fit" is how this split gets a reputation for being too light. It is not too light. You were just doing 90-second rest on a set of 5.
What to change in week 4
Weeks 1 to 3 you are buying information. Same lifts. Same rest. Add reps inside the range. Load moves when the top of the range is honest.
Week 4 is a small fork, not a new program:
- Compounds moved on both uppers and both lowers. Add the smallest plate to those lifts. Leave the accessories.
- Upper A moved, Upper B did not. Add load to A. On B, either drop a set or swap the second press to something that does not fight A (a machine press instead of another barbell). The second hit is supposed to be a second stimulus, not a worse copy of the first.
- Lower B is a mess every week. The gap after Lower A is too small, or Lower B is too heavy. Put a rest day between them if you somehow did not. Or make Lower B a hack squat and a hinge that is not a deadlift.
- You feel fine and slightly bored. Add one set to one lagging muscle, on the second session of the week. Second session. Adding it to Monday just makes Monday longer and Thursday worse.
If the whole block felt heavy from day two, you started too hard. Week 4 is a down week: same exercises, one fewer set, stop two reps earlier. Then start a new 3-week block at the loads you finished week 3 with, not the loads you wish you had used.
Put this in a log. If you run the four templates above, the loads sit next to last month instead of in your head. A spreadsheet will also do that. "I think the bench went up" is not.
Missing Tuesday
This is the quiet advantage of four days.
Miss an upper and you still have another upper. Miss a lower and you still have another lower. The week is bent, not empty. You do not need to double Thursday to "make up" Tuesday. You skip Tuesday and you train Thursday as written.
What you do not do:
- Combine Upper A and Lower A into one heroic session. That session will be a bad upper and a bad lower.
- Shift the whole week later so you still get four days, if that means training four days in a row. Four in a row is a different split, with a different recovery cost.
- Add the missed squat onto Friday's deadlift day. Friday then stops being a session and starts being a fight.
If the missed day is always the same day, delete it and you have a 3-day week. That is a full-body conversation, not a worse 4-day. Three serious full-body days will beat three-quarters of an upper/lower week you keep failing to complete.
Sick: skip. Tired from work: train, but cap the extras and keep the first two lifts. Tired from the last session: you programmed the gap wrong.
When four days is the wrong number
Go to three if four is already a push. Full body, three days, compounds first. You will practice the lifts more often, which is what most people who "need a more advanced split" actually needed.
Go to five or PPL if four days are easy, sleep is good, and a muscle is clearly behind. The extra day should be a second look at that muscle, not a new theme. A fifth day that is "arms" on a split that already presses and pulls twice is optional. A fifth day that is a second lower, if legs are the goal, is a reason to change.
Stay on four while the compounds are moving and the week is getting done. That is a higher bar than it sounds. Most of the people asking for a more complicated split have not cleared it.
Four days will not make you a specialist. It will not bury a single muscle the way a bro split can. It will, if you add load for a year and eat like you mean it, make you bigger and stronger than the 6-day card you half-finished in January.
Related
- Push pull legs routine if you can protect 6 days, or want the 3-day PPL rotation
- 5 day workout split for a body-part week or a 5-day hybrid
- How long to rest between sets
- Weightlifting percentage chart