Warm-up Calculator
Enter the weight of your top set and your bar. The Warm-up Calculator gives you a ramp of lighter sets to work up to it, with what to load on each side. It's free and needs no account.
How the calculator builds warm-ups:
- It starts at the empty bar, and no warm-up is ever lighter than the bar.
- If two steps round to the same weight, it drops the repeat.
- If your work set is at or below the bar weight, there are no warm-ups.
- By default the warm-ups are the bar, then 40%, 60% and 80% of your work set, rounded to your increment. For a 140 kg work set that's 20, 55, 85 and 112.5 kg.
The ramp below is a different, hand-built example.
A sensible way to warm up
There's no single correct warm-up. Most lifters do something like this:
- Start with the empty bar for an easy set of 5 to 10 reps.
- Take a few jumps up. Bigger jumps early, smaller ones near the top.
- Drop the reps as the weight climbs. Fives early, then threes, twos and a single. The point is to practise the lift and get ready, not to get tired.
- Stop short of the top set. The last warm-up is usually around 85–90% of the top set, for one rep.
- Keep jumps easy to load. Adding one plate pair at a time (say, 10 kg a side) is quicker than reloading the whole bar.
Lighter top sets need fewer warm-ups. Heavier ones need more steps, so no single jump feels like a shock.
Worked example: 140 kg squat, 20 kg bar
Here's a ramp with roughly 20 kg jumps, so you add a pair of plates each time.
| Set | Weight | Reps | Per side, no collars (bar 20 kg) | Per side, 2.5 kg comp collars (bar + collars 25 kg) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warm-up 1 | 20 kg (bar) | 10 | nothing | not needed |
| Warm-up 2 | 60 kg | 5 | 20 → 20 | 17.5 → 15 + 2.5 |
| Warm-up 3 | 80 kg | 3 | 30 → 25 + 5 | 27.5 → 25 + 2.5 |
| Warm-up 4 | 100 kg | 2 | 40 → 25 + 15 | 37.5 → 25 + 10 + 2.5 |
| Warm-up 5 | 120 kg | 1 | 50 → 25 + 25 | 47.5 → 25 + 20 + 2.5 |
| Top set | 140 kg | as programmed | 60 → 25 + 25 + 10 | 57.5 → 25 + 25 + 5 + 2.5 |
Those warm-ups land at about 43%, 57%, 71% and 86% of the top set. The per-side maths is (weight − bar − collars) ÷ 2. The Plate Calculator explains it, along with IPF colours and loading order.
If your sheet already lists warm-ups, follow the sheet. SpreadLift keeps your sheet's own numbers.
More free calculators
Check your numbers and train safely
Warm-ups are a guide, not a rule. If a set feels heavy, take an extra step or a smaller jump. Check the bar, collars and plates you actually have, use safeties or a spotter, and stop if something hurts.