Set your training days and see the rotation, the frequency it gives you, and what goes in each session.
Estimates are for general guidance only and are not medical advice. For a personalised plan, book a free guided tour at RPM Gym.
Six days is the version PPL was built around. Every muscle group gets two sessions a week, the rest day sits where no muscle trains twice inside 48 hours, and the split does what its reputation says.
Three days is a different programme wearing the same name. Push, pull and legs once each means every muscle group is trained once a week, which is the low end of what the frequency research supports. It works, and an upper/lower split across the same three days would hit each muscle more often. Worth knowing before you commit to it.
Four and five days turn PPL into a rolling rotation rather than a weekly template. You keep the push-pull-legs order and carry on where you stopped, so Monday is a push day one week and a legs day the next. That's the intended behaviour, not a scheduling failure.
3 days → one full cycle a week, each muscle 1× 4-5 days → rolling rotation, each muscle ~1.3-1.7× 6 days → two full cycles, each muscle 2× Push = chest, shoulders, triceps · Pull = back, rear delts, biceps · Legs = quads, hamstrings, glutes, calves
Six days a week, an intermediate lifter.
Two sessions per muscle group with at least 48 hours between them, and one genuine rest day. This is the arrangement the split's reputation was earned on, and it needs six available days to work.
It's workable but rarely the best first choice. At three days it trains each muscle group once a week, and beginners improve fastest on frequency — two or three exposures per movement while they're still learning the lifts. Full body or upper/lower across the same three days does more.
Six if you can genuinely train six, because that's the version that gives every muscle two sessions. Three works and is a different programme. Four and five are the rolling rotation, which is fine and just doesn't repeat on fixed weekdays.
Chest, shoulders and triceps — everything that presses. A horizontal press, a vertical press, an incline or fly variation, a lateral raise and a triceps movement covers it in five exercises.
Yes, and it's the most common way it's run. Just be clear about what you're buying: one session per muscle group per week, with more volume in each session. If you can only train three days and growth is the goal, compare it against upper/lower before deciding.
At six days, yes — the rest day placement is doing real work separating the two cycles. At four or five, no. The rotation rolls, and trying to pin it to weekdays is what makes people skip sessions to stay on schedule.
At six days PPL gives more volume per muscle per session; at four days upper/lower gives the same twice-weekly frequency with better recovery spacing. Below four days, neither is as strong as full body. The split calculator does this comparison at your day count.
Bring your week to a free guided tour at RPM Gym in Al Manhal and a coach will show you what belongs in each session on the equipment you'll actually be using.