Bodyweight training is your foundation and the driver of all your other strengths and abilities.

Too many trainers and athletes quickly overlook and may even forget to include bodyweight training into their programs and routines. However, when you train with your body weight, you can become incredibly strong.

Bodyweight training is all about the basics and the truth is that your body can always fall back on its basic strength no matter how skilled you are. Your whole body weight will always be the building blocks and the basics that will lead to a higher skill level in other things.

In terms of starting off with bodyweight training, all of the essential motions must be known: squats, lunges, push-ups, pull-ups, rows, and variations of the plank. You also should be able to climb, crawl, sprint and jump.

Bodyweight training is the foundation of you and the driver of all your other strengths and abilities.

It will help you lose weight, build muscle, and prevent injuries. Tools like kettlebells, dumbbells, barbells, and sandbags, without an appropriate body weight and conditioning base, lose their effectiveness.

New clients often come into the gym wanting to do weight training and lift heavy weights. However, good trainers shouldn’t be starting off beginners with such exercises.

Many clients don’t understand that to be able to lift weights effectively they need to build up their basic strength and muscles to do so first.

Bodyweight training is a necessity whether you are thinking of advancing onto lifting weights or you just want to get some exercise in and become stronger. It’s essential to learning the correct form and learning how to handle your body weight effectively.

We have compiled a list of the best bodyweight workout programs for you to get started.

ONNIT 6 Bodyweight

Onnit 6 Bodyweight will give you a full-body transformation in just 6 weeks. The program can be done from home and within your own time. This means that you can exercise at any time of the day that suits your schedule.

They provide six exercises that focus on different areas of your body. Cardio and movement, muscle and endurance, and tone and definition. The three sessions are one hour long.

This program will aid you in losing weight, building muscle, get you moving, and will make you generally feel better in your health.

The videos are led by John Wolf who is a successful fitness coach who founded and owned Wolf Fitness Systems, an unconventional gym in California. Not long after that, he became the Chief Fitness Officer for Onnit.

One of the greatest things about this program is that it also provides a meal plan for you since we all know how important the role of food is in getting fit.

They are also mindful of incorporating things to improve your mental wellbeing thus the fitness plan also includes yoga sessions.

You are granted access to communicate and ask questions to the ONNIT team about advice, support, tips, and tricks. You are also able to choose the intensity of your workout, therefore this plan can cater to anyone from beginners with little to no experience to intermediate levels.

Mark Lauren’s Bodyweight Training 2.0

This 12-week fitness program aims to develop your physique into a high-level athletic body while using up the smallest amount of energy. Over 12 weeks you have the choice to pick out 64 exercises and their transitional movements.

The program gives you movement patterns, learning these will make a huge life-changing difference to how you approach fitness.

One of the main goals of this program is also to reduce the chances of injury and to learn to perform at the level of an athlete.

A great thing about this program is that it can be done by beginners. You can go from a novice to moving like a professional in 12 weeks.

The program provides an active community forum in which you can find people who are also taking the program where you can help each other stay motivated. This can be a safe space to ask questions in the group or chat with professional trainers.

The exercises include high-level and functional movements such as A-Frames, Mosse Antlers, Bloomers, and RDLs. You may not know what these are but that’s okay because the point is that you will learn.

This program is 100% bodyweight training meaning that it can be done at home without the need for a gym or any equipment.

You will be working out 4 times a week for 20-50 minutes each day. You start off with less workout time and build it up to 50 minutes as you progress through the program.

The 90-Day Bodyweight Training Plan by Todd Kuslikis

Todd started participating in martial arts classes when he went into high school and he now realizes that was one of the best decisions he ever made. The great part of martial arts training was the bodyweight conditioning he went through.

In this program, he incorporates all that he learned during his years in Kenpo Karate into an ultimate bodyweight training program.

The Karate-based conditioning program involves the same style of training that they use in Kenpo Karate.

It combines three important aspects:

No rest between exercises: after completing one exercise you have no rest between the next one. The goal is to get as little rest between sets as possible. In Karate this is done to condition your body and mimic fights where there is no time to rest. In bodyweight training, it improves your endurance and stamina.
Keeping track of reps: each time you perform an exercise the goal is to do as many reps as possible. After each workout, you keep track of the reps and you aim to do better the next day.
Improving mental framework: unlike other workout programs that are offered on the internet, this one requires you to push yourself to your limits. The workouts will train your mind to push through even after you are fully fatigued. However, before beginning this training you also have to set yourself up and be ready to break yourself mentally.

Each workout provides upper-body, lower-body, core, and full-body exercises. Every time you are training you are getting a whole-body workout in. a lot of the exercises in this program are not the basics that you may be used to.

This program is great if you are someone who wants to push yourself to your limits and try something new.

Athletic Nomad: 6-Week Bodyweight Travel Workout Program

Athletic Nomad is a six-week bodyweight program that was designed to introduce beginners to the basics of bodyweight training.

The program assesses your fitness level at the beginning and end. In between, you’ll be doing progressively harder workouts that include pull-ups, push-ups, squats, lunges, and variations of them.

Athletic Nomad features:

Six weeks of full-body workouts with strength, stamina, and recovery sections.
Workouts calibrated for building bodyweight training ability and improving strength and conditioning levels.
Assessments to test your fitness level.
A training plan that gets progressively harder and will transform your body into a fat-burning furnace.
Requires no equipment (except a pull-up bar or something to do pull-ups on).

Fittest Travel includes this program as the first in a series of programs that build on the progress you make with them.

Final Thoughts

Overall there are three of some of the best bodyweight workout programs that will transform your fitness, health, and physique in a number of weeks.

The ONNIT program is great for beginners who wish to progress into weightlifting. The program provides you with all the muscle-building you will need to be successful in weightlifting.

Mark Lauren’s program is great for anyone looking to set up long-term healthy fitness habits. Todd Kuslikis’ program is for anyone looking to challenge themselves and go full hardcore in their training.

Athletic Nomad is for beginners who are looking for a travel-friendly bodyweight training program that covers the basics.

Remember that in order to change your habits and your body it requires a commitment from you. Although you are paying for a program you need to make sure you’re committed enough to follow through with it.