How to Increase Your Vertical Jump: Exercises & Training Plan

What Determines Your Vertical Jump?

At takeoff, your jump height is decided almost entirely by your vertical takeoff velocity. To leave the ground quickly you need three things:

• Maximal strength: the total force your hips, knees, and ankles can produce. This sets the ceiling for how hard you can push against the ground.
• Rate of force development (power): how much of that force you can express in the ~0.2-0.3 seconds of a jump. Two athletes with equal strength can jump very differently if one can apply force faster.
• The stretch-shortening cycle: the elastic rebound you get from a quick countermovement. Loading your muscles and tendons briefly, then reversing instantly, stores elastic energy you can release at takeoff. This is why plyometrics work.

Markovic and Jaric (2007) showed that loading a jump differently, whether heavy, moderate, or light, changes the mechanical output in predictable ways, and that jump performance is best understood as high-velocity mechanical output of the leg extensors. In practice, that means a strong, fast, elastic athlete jumps highest. A 100 kg squat athlete who can explode will outjump a 160 kg squatter who moves slowly, which is why training must cover both sides of the equation.

One more piece matters that most beginners ignore: body weight. You are launching your entire mass into the air, so every extra kilogram of fat must be accelerated too. That is why two lifters with identical squat numbers can jump differently, and why your strength-to-weight ratio is a better predictor of jump height than your raw 1RM. The strongest jumpers are rarely the strongest squatters; they are the strongest squatters per kilogram of body weight.

Start With a Baseline Measurement

Before training, measure your current jump so you can track progress. Test with the wall-and-chalk or Vertec method, take your best of three jumps, and record it. Then compare it to your age and sex with the vertical jump calculator to see where you start.

Use a standard countermovement jump with an arm swing, because that is what most published norms and athlete benchmarks use. Test in the morning after a rest day, after the same warm-up each time, and on the same surface. Write down the number before you touch a barbell. Without a baseline you cannot tell whether the program is working, and most people who skip this step end up chasing noise instead of progress.

For context on where you stand: the average untrained man in his 20s jumps about 16-20 inches and the average woman about 12-16 inches. Recreationally active adults sit a few inches higher, and competitive basketball or volleyball players routinely clear 24-28 inches. Whatever your starting number, the training below raises it.

The Exercises That Raise Your Jump

Ranked by how directly they transfer to jump height, your program should include one or two lifts from each group.

Heavy strength work (the foundation)

The squat is the king of jump-strength exercises because it trains the exact muscles that extend your hips, knees, and ankles at takeoff. Peterson, Rhea and Alvar (2004) found that untrained people gain strength fastest with 3-4 sets per muscle group, 2-3 days per week, and Wernbom et al. (2007) confirmed that muscle grows with progressive loading over months. Neither study is about jumping, but both describe the strength foundation every jumper needs. If your squat is below 1.5x body weight, this is your priority.

Ballistic and plyometric work (the transfer)

• Box jumps: build confidence, landing skill, and fast takeoffs. Progress box height gradually.
• Depth jumps: step off a box (12-30 inches) and jump as high as possible on landing. This is the most powerful plyometric for jump height when used sparingly.
• Jump squats (light load): squat with 10-30% of your squat max and jump each rep, landing softly.
• Pogo hops: small, rapid, straight-legged hops that train ankle stiffness and rebound speed.
• Broad jumps and bounds: horizontal power that carries over to the vertical and to sprint starts.

de Villarreal, Kellis, Kraemer and Izquierdo (2009) meta-analyzed plyometric training and found that programs of 4-6 weeks, 2-3 sessions per week, with roughly 10-20 jumps per session, produce the best jump gains, and that combining plyometrics with strength training beats either alone. The volume number matters. Twenty high-quality jumps done fresh are worth more than fifty done tired, because each rep should be maximal. Half-effort plyometrics train nothing useful.

Technique: Free Inches You Are Leaving Behind

Many people jump low because of poor mechanics, not weak legs. Fixing your takeoff is worth 1-3 inches immediately:

1. Use your arms: a powerful arm swing adds roughly 2 inches to a jump. Drive both arms up hard as your legs extend, and let them continue upward past your head.
2. Countermove to the right depth: bend your knees and hips to roughly a quarter-to-half squat, then reverse immediately. Too deep slows you down; too shallow wastes the stretch.
3. Extend fully: ankles, knees, and hips should all be straight at takeoff. Incomplete extension at the ankles (letting the heel lift early) leaks power.
4. Stay upright: leaning too far forward throws force into the horizontal direction. Jump straight up.
5. Explode, do not push: think about snapping your body tall as fast as possible. Slower, grinding takeoffs leave the elastic energy unused.

Film yourself from the side and compare your takeoff to a good jumper. Most people discover they bend their knees but forget the hips, or swing their arms late. These are technique problems that no amount of squatting will fix. Bosco, Luhtanen and Komi (1983) built their entire jump-testing method on the assumption that technique and elastic energy are part of the jump, which is why fixing mechanics shows up so quickly on a jump mat.

The 6-Week Vertical Jump Plan

This program trains three days per week. Alternate heavy strength days with power days, and keep every session under about 60 minutes. Warm up each session with 5 minutes of easy cardio and 2-3 easy jumps.

• Weeks 1-2: learn the movements at moderate intensity. Stop plyometric sets 2-3 reps short of failure and prioritize clean landings.
• Weeks 3-4: add weight to the squat each session (2.5-5 kg), and increase box height or depth-jump box height slightly.
• Weeks 5-6: keep strength rising and lower plyometric volume to 2 sets per exercise so you stay fast and fresh. Test your jump on week 6.

Space the days out, for example Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and keep at least one full rest day between sessions. The nervous system, not just the muscles, needs recovery from plyometrics. If your knees or Achilles start complaining, cut the depth jumps in half before you touch the rest of the program, because landing quality beats volume every time.

For a more structured, longer option see the full 8-week vertical jump training program, which adds a peaking phase that converts your new strength and speed into a bigger max jump.

Why Squat Strength Matters, and When It Stops

The relationship between your back squat and your jump is real but not linear. Up to roughly a 1.5x bodyweight squat, adding strength produces big jump gains, because a weak athlete is leaving force on the table. Past that point, the correlation flattens: athletes who squat 2x bodyweight do not necessarily outjump athletes who squat 1.75x, because the faster, lighter athlete expresses the force they have more efficiently.

This is the transfer problem that our guide to squats and the vertical jump covers in detail. The practical takeaway: build your squat to about 1.5x bodyweight first, then shift emphasis to power and plyometrics while keeping strength maintenance work in the program. Training strength and power simultaneously, in the same week, is what the research consistently shows works best.

Recovery and Frequency: Doing More Is Not Better

Jump training is deceptive because the sessions are short. A 45-minute plyometric workout feels easy compared to a heavy squat session, so athletes assume they can do it every day. They cannot. Every depth jump is a maximal neuromuscular effort, and the adaptations happen during the 48-72 hours after the session, not during it.

Sleep is the most underrated variable. Jump height and rate of force development drop measurably after a poor night, and chronic sleep debt blunts the neural adaptations that make jump training work. Aim for 7-9 hours, keep lower-body sessions 48 hours apart, and take a light week every 6-8 weeks. If your jump numbers start dropping even though you are training hard, you are overreaching, not adapting.

Mistakes That Cap Your Jump

• Only doing plyometrics: jump training without a strength base plateaus fast. Heavy squats and deadlifts create the force you convert into height.
• Too much volume: 50 jumps per session sounds productive but degrades jump quality and increases injury risk. Ten to twenty high-quality jumps beat fifty sloppy ones.
• Training tired: plyometrics demand fresh legs. Never do depth jumps or max-effort jumps at the end of a long session.
• Ignoring body weight: every extra pound of fat must be accelerated upward. Training to jump while slowly improving your strength-to-weight ratio pays double.
• Neglecting recovery: vertical jump progress is built during rest, not during the session. Sleep 7-9 hours and space lower-body days 48+ hours apart.
• Retesting too often: weekly testing shows fatigue noise, not progress. Test every 4-6 weeks under identical conditions.

How Jump Training Changes With Age and Sport

Vertical jump peaks in the early 20s and declines roughly 10% per decade in untrained adults, but trained adults lose height much more slowly. Masters athletes who maintain power training often keep 16-20 inch jumps into their 50s, because the rate of force development, the quality most responsible for jump height, stays trainable well into old age. The same strength and plyometric work that raises a teenager's jump preserves a 50-year-old's mobility and fall resistance.

Sport context matters too. Basketball and volleyball players need a higher vertical jump to clear rims and blocks, and they usually train the jump as a season-long skill. Football skill positions use vertical jump as a combine metric, with the NFL Combine average around 30 inches. Track athletes train the jump as an accessory to sprinting and field event power. Your target depends on your sport, but the training principles are identical: strength, speed, elasticity, and a body weight that does not hold you back.

The horizontal version of the jump, measured by the standing long jump, responds to the same program and is worth tracking alongside your vertical. Both feed into the broader picture of lower-body power that supports gait speed in older adults and upper-body function via measures like grip strength.