The PHUL Workout Program Explained

Quick answer: PHUL stands for Power Hypertrophy Upper Lower. It is a 4-day training split with two heavy power days in the 3 to 5 rep range and two higher-volume hypertrophy days in the 8 to 15 rep range, hitting upper and lower body twice each per week. It was written by Brandon Campbell and published on Muscle & Strength in 2013.

You have run a beginner program, added weight every session, and then stopped being able to. Now you are stuck choosing between a powerlifting template that ignores your arms and a bodybuilding split that never goes heavy.

PHUL is the standard answer to that particular problem, and it has stayed popular for over a decade for good reason.

What does PHUL stand for?

Power Hypertrophy Upper Lower. The name is the program.

Four training days a week. Two of them are upper body, two are lower body. One of each pair is a power day built around heavy compound lifts in the 3 to 5 rep range. The other is a hypertrophy day using moderate loads for 8 to 15 reps with more isolation work.

The original write-up by Brandon Campbell was published on Muscle & Strength in February 2013 and has been the reference version ever since.

The logic is that strength and size respond to different stimuli, and you do not have to pick. Heavy low-rep work drives the strength that lets you use more load later. Higher-rep work accumulates the volume that drives growth.

What does the PHUL split look like?

The standard week runs Monday, Tuesday, rest, Thursday, Friday, then the weekend off.

That structure trains every major muscle group twice a week, which is the part worth paying attention to. A systematic review and meta-analysis of training frequency found that on a volume-equated basis, training a muscle group twice a week produced superior hypertrophy compared with once a week. Whether three times beats twice was left unresolved.

You can shift the days around. Two on, one off, two on, two off is the intent, and keeping at least one rest day between the power and hypertrophy sessions for the same body part matters more than which weekday you start on.

What are the four PHUL workouts?

Here is the program as originally written.

Day 1: Upper Power

Day 2: Lower Power

Day 3: Upper Hypertrophy

Day 4: Lower Hypertrophy

That is more work than a lot of people expect. The upper days run seven exercises. Budget 75 to 90 minutes if you rest properly on the heavy sets, and our guide to how long to rest between sets covers what "properly" means.

Who is PHUL actually for?

Intermediates who have stalled on linear progression. This is the core audience. If you ran a beginner program, added 2.5kg a session, and eventually could not, PHUL is a sensible next step.

People who want both strength and size. If you care about your bench number and how your arms look, the split is designed around exactly that tension.

People who can genuinely train four days a week. Four sessions is the whole design. Running it three days a week makes it a different, worse program.

It is not for beginners. If you are in your first year, a simpler full-body plan will produce more for less. Our beginner workout plan is a better starting point, and you will progress faster on it.

It is not ideal on a hard cut. The volume is high and the heavy work is demanding. In a large calorie deficit you will struggle to recover from both.

How do you progress on PHUL?

The original program does not prescribe a rigid progression scheme, which is both its flexibility and the reason people stall on it.

On power days, add weight. Work in the 3 to 5 range and add the smallest increment once you hit the top of the range on all working sets. Progress here will be slow, and it should be.

On hypertrophy days, add reps first. Take a set to the top of its rep range across all sets, then add weight and start again at the bottom. This is standard double progression, and it is the right tool for 8 to 12 rep work.

Deload when the power days stop moving. Two to three weeks of no progress on the heavy compounds usually means you need a lighter week rather than more effort. Our deload week guide covers how to structure one.

Run it for 8 to 12 weeks before deciding whether it worked. A four-week verdict on any program is mostly noise.

If you want to see how the plan's weekly volume splits across muscle groups before you commit, you can get a free private link to the workout plan optimizer, which maps what your week actually trains.

How does PHUL compare to other splits?

Versus push/pull/legs. PPL usually runs 6 days for twice-weekly frequency, or 3 days for once-weekly. PHUL gets twice-weekly frequency out of 4 days, which is its main practical advantage. Our PPL vs upper/lower comparison works through the trade in detail.

Versus a standard upper/lower. PHUL is an upper/lower split with the rep ranges deliberately separated. A generic upper/lower often runs similar reps on both days. See our upper/lower split guide for the base template.

Versus 5/3/1 or 5x5. Those are strength programs with accessories bolted on. PHUL gives roughly equal billing to size work. If your only goal is a bigger total, the 5/3/1 program is more focused.

Versus PHAT. PHAT is the 5-day, higher-volume relative of the same idea. More work, more recovery demand, same principle.

What is the hardest part of running PHUL?

Keeping track of it.

Four sessions, roughly 24 working exercises across the week, two different rep ranges on the same muscle groups. Bench appears on Monday for 3 to 5 and incline bench on Thursday for 8 to 12, and both need to progress independently.

That is a lot to hold in your head, and it is why so many PHUL runs quietly turn into "whatever I did last time, roughly".

A simple starting plan

1. Set your starting weights conservatively. On power days, pick loads you could do for 6 to 7 reps and only do 5. You want room to add weight for two months.
2. Fix the four days in your calendar before week one. PHUL falls apart when sessions get skipped, because the twice-weekly frequency is the whole point.
3. Pick one progression rule per day type. Weight on power days, reps then weight on hypertrophy days. Write the rule at the top of your log.
4. Cut the accessory work before the compounds if you are short on time. Skipping calf raises costs you very little. Skipping squats costs you the session.
5. Review at week 4 and week 8. Check whether the power lifts and the hypertrophy lifts are both moving. If only one is, adjust that side rather than scrapping the plan.

Keeping the log you already have

If you already log in Apple Notes or a notebook, you do not need a program-specific app to run PHUL. You need last Monday's bench numbers visible on this Monday.

The problem is that a plain text log gives you a wall of entries and no comparison. Twenty-four exercises across four days becomes genuinely hard to review by scrolling.

Gym Note Plus reads the plain text you already write:

• Type Bench 100x5x3 between sets, with no exercise pickers or dropdown menus
• Every exercise gets its own chart, so power-day bench and hypertrophy-day incline track separately
• Personal records surface automatically on both rep ranges
• Your existing notes import, so you keep the history you already built

You can try it without installing anything. Paste one of your sessions into the free notes to workout translator and see what it turns into.

PHUL works because it trains everything twice a week. It fails when sessions get skipped, because a four-day program run three days is just a program you are not doing.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the PHUL workout program?

PHUL stands for Power Hypertrophy Upper Lower. It is a 4-day resistance training split created by Brandon Campbell and published on Muscle & Strength in 2013. The week includes an upper power day and lower power day using 3 to 5 reps on compound lifts, plus an upper and lower hypertrophy day using 8 to 15 reps with more isolation work.

Is PHUL good for beginners?

PHUL is designed for intermediate lifters rather than beginners. Its volume, exercise count, and separate progression schemes for power and hypertrophy days assume you already know the main barbell lifts. Beginners generally progress faster on a simpler full-body program with fewer exercises and a single linear progression rule.

How long should you run PHUL?

Run PHUL for 8 to 12 weeks before judging it or changing programs. That window allows a full progression cycle on the power lifts and enough sessions per exercise to see a genuine trend. Many lifters run PHUL for considerably longer, deloading every 6 to 8 weeks when the heavy compounds stop moving.

Can you do PHUL 3 days a week?

Not without changing what the program is. PHUL's structure depends on training each half of the body twice weekly, once heavy and once for volume. Cutting to three days removes one of those sessions and drops frequency for half the body to once a week. A dedicated 3-day full-body program is a better fit for that schedule.

Is PHUL better than push pull legs?

Neither is better in general. PHUL delivers twice-weekly frequency for every muscle group in 4 sessions, while push/pull/legs usually needs 6 days to match that frequency. PHUL suits people with four training days and goals split between strength and size. PPL suits higher training availability and more per-session specialisation.

Final Takeaways

• PHUL is a 4-day upper/lower split with two heavy power days and two higher-volume hypertrophy days.
• Every muscle group is trained twice a week, which is the structural reason the program works on only four sessions.
• It is an intermediate program. Beginners will get more from a simpler full-body plan run for longer.
• Progress power days with weight and hypertrophy days with reps first. Two rep ranges need two rules.
• Run it for 8 to 12 weeks and track each exercise separately, since bench on Monday and incline on Thursday progress at different speeds.