Full body workout 3 days a week: the complete plan
Three sessions a week, each training the whole body, is one of the simplest ways to make the most of limited gym time: every muscle is trained three times a week, and a missed session leaves no muscle group forgotten. This is our three-day plan, with every choice explained.
1.Why three full-body sessions
With three days available, splitting the body into parts means training each muscle once a week. Training the whole body every session does the opposite: each muscle group gets three stimuli, with one or two rest days between them, and the week’s volume is spread out instead of piled into a single day.
There is a practical upside too: miss a session and no muscle goes a week without work. That is why full body is so common with people who are starting out and with people whose schedule does not forgive.
This plan is ours: it is not a copy of a program with an author. It was built to hit the targets NoteFit opens a new week with — 12 sets for chest, back and glutes — with a little more for legs.
2.The three sessions
Every session opens with a compound leg exercise, follows with a push and a pull, and closes with accessories. What changes between A, B and C is the pattern of each movement: squat, bench press and barbell row in A; Romanian deadlift, overhead press and pulldown in B; leg press, dumbbell bench press and seated cable row in C.
Do the sessions in order with a rest day between them — Monday, Wednesday and Friday, say. If a week only leaves two days, do A and B and start the next week with C: the order matters more than the day of the week.
Full body A
The week’s three workouts, with each exercise’s sets, reps and rest.
| Exercise | Muscles | Sets | Reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SquatBarbell | Legs + Glutes | 3 | 6-8 | 3:00 min |
| Bench PressBarbell | Chest + Triceps | 4 | 6-8 | 2:30 min |
| Bent Over RowBarbell | Back + Biceps | 4 | 8-10 | 2:00 min |
| Seated Leg CurlMachine | Legs | 3 | 10-12 | 1:30 min |
| Lateral RaiseDumbbells | Shoulders | 3 | 12-15 | 1:00 min |
Note on the workout: Three workouts a week with a rest day between them (Monday, Wednesday and Friday, say). Add load once every set closes at the top of the range.
Full body B
| Exercise | Muscles | Sets | Reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Romanian DeadliftBarbell | Legs + Glutes | 3 | 8-10 | 2:30 min |
| Overhead PressBarbell | Shoulders + Triceps | 3 | 6-8 | 2:30 min |
| PulldownMachine | Back + Biceps | 4 | 8-10 | 2:00 min |
| Incline Bench PressDumbbells | Chest + Triceps | 4 | 8-10 | 2:00 min |
| CrunchMachine | Abs | 3 | 12-15 | 1:00 min |
Full body C
| Exercise | Muscles | Sets | Reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leg PressMachine | Legs + Glutes | 3 | 10-12 | 2:00 min |
| Bench PressDumbbells | Chest + Triceps | 4 | 8-10 | 2:00 min |
| Seated Cable RowMachine | Back + Biceps | 4 | 10-12 | 1:30 min |
| Hip ThrustBarbell | Legs + Glutes | 3 | 8-10 | 2:00 min |
| CurlDumbbellsSuperset A | Biceps | 2 | 10-12 | 1:00 min |
| Rope PushdownCablesSuperset A | Triceps | 2 | 10-12 | 1:00 min |
Want this full-body plan in your own account?
Create an account and start with the block already built: 4 weeks of these 3 workouts, with the sets, reps, rest and each muscle’s volume targets. The loads are left blank for yours.
3.Reps, rest and effort
The heavy compounds — squat, bench press, Romanian deadlift and overhead press — sit between 6 and 10 reps with 150 to 180 seconds of rest; the other exercises go up to 8 to 15 reps with 60 to 120. Heavy load comes first, while technique is fresh, and the high reps at the end add volume at little cost to the next session.
Finish your sets with one or two reps in reserve (RIR 1-2): close to failure, without getting there. With three full-body sessions a week, taking every set to failure piles up more fatigue than a rest day can clear.
4.How to progress
Use double progression: keep the load until every set reaches the top of the range — 3×10 on the Romanian deadlift, say, which sits at 8-10 — and only then add the smallest step your gym allows. That is progressive overload week after week, without ever testing a max.
After four to five weeks, take a deload week: the same sessions with half the sets. Then start a new mesocycle from the loads you reached, or swap the exercise that stopped moving.
5.How many sets it gives each muscle
The week has 52 sets: 17, 17 and 18 per session. Chest, back and glutes get 12 each, legs 15, shoulders 6 and abs 3. We counted the way the app counts: every set counts for the main muscle and for the secondary one.
The arms show why the split between direct and indirect matters. Triceps show 17 sets, but only 2 are direct: the other 15 come from the bench presses and the overhead press. Biceps get 14, 12 of them from the rows and the pulldown. A three-day plan does not need an arm day: the work is already there, it just does not show at first glance.
If you want more volume for one muscle, add one set a week to that muscle and watch its total move in the panel before you add sets everywhere.
| Muscle group | Direct | Indirect | Total in NoteFit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Legs | 15 | 0 | 15 |
| Glutes | 0 | 12 | 12 |
| Chest | 12 | 0 | 12 |
| Back | 12 | 0 | 12 |
| Shoulders | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| Triceps | 2 | 15 | 17 |
| Biceps | 2 | 12 | 14 |
| Abs | 3 | 0 | 3 |
6.When to move to another plan
As long as the load keeps going up, there is no reason to change. The signal is a different one: when you need more sets per muscle than three sessions can hold without getting too long. At that point, four days of upper/lower or six of push/pull/legs give each muscle group more room.
Changing plans does not erase what you did. In NoteFit the previous block stays in the athlete’s history, and the next one can start from the loads where this one ended.
Tools
Open the calculatorWeekly volume calculator: sets per muscle group
Pick the week’s exercises, set the sets and see how many sets each muscle receives — no account needed.
Guides
Training splits: which one to choose and why
Full body, upper/lower, push-pull-legs or a body-part split? The right split is the one that fits the days you have and spreads volume per muscle.
Read the guideA 4-day upper/lower plan, exercise by exercise
The full week of a 4-day upper/lower plan, with sets, reps, rest and loads — and the reason behind every choice, exercise by exercise.
Read the guideFrequently asked questions
Is this plan good for beginners?
Yes, and it was built with them in mind: few exercises, every basic pattern covered, and 12 sets a week on the big muscle groups, near the bottom of the range our sets-per-week guide gives for people starting out.
Can I swap the exercises?
Between blocks, yes. Within a block, keep them: you can only see the load go up if the exercise stays the same for four or five weeks. If you have to swap, pick one that trains the same muscle in the same rep range.
Can I do it at home?
With a barbell, a bench and dumbbells you can do the main lifts. The machine and cable exercises swap for dumbbell or bodyweight equivalents — Bulgarian split squats for the leg press, pull-ups for the pulldown, dumbbell rows for the seated row — keeping the sets and reps. The app accepts any exercise you type.
What if I miss a session?
Do the next one in the order instead of jumping to the day’s. One late session breaks nothing; always skipping C, on the other hand, takes the leg press, the hip thrust and the only direct arm work out of the week.