Pull ups are a Compound Exercise

Are pull ups a compound exercise? Yes, pull up and chin ups are compound exercises.

What is a compound exercise ?

Compound exercises involve movement at more than one joint, and often train many muscle groups at one time. Isolation exercises involve movement at only one joint.

Both the chin up and the pull up involve movement of the scapulo-thoracic joints, the glenohumeral joints and the elbow joints.

A seated leg extension is an isolation movement. It only involves movement at the knee joint.

Benefits to Compound Exercises

Because the chin up and the pull up are compound exercises, they have a greater energy cost than single joint movements.

Pull ups and chin ups burn more calories than single joint exercises because they use more muscle mass than those isolation exercises.

They also may be more effective for both training economy and muscle hypertrophy (growth) and muscular strength.

The pull up and chin up train a lot of different muscle groups because they are compound exercises. Pull ups and chin ups train the lats, rhomboids, teres major and minor, infraspinatus, lower traps, rear delta, biceps. They also train the abs and glutes.

If you can use one exercise to stimulate growth in several muscles, why would you use three isolation exercises to achieve the same effect?

When you exercise primarily with compound exercises that use a ton of muscle mass, your workouts become more metabolically demanding.

This means you burn more calories, and you also stimulate your heart and cardiovascular system. You also burn more calories recovering from an exercise session of mostly compound exercises like the pull up, chin up and others.

Compound exercises like chin ups and pull ups are also natural movements. That means that may be better for athletic performance. They also enhance neuro-muscular coordination more than isolation movements. And, they might even be better for long term joint health.

In SuperTraining, Verkhoshansky and Siff claim that natural, free weight or body weight compound movements like the pull up are always superior to their machine alternatives (the pulldown). These authors claim that free weight, compound exercises improve coordination and performance more than machine or isolation movements.

Conclusions: Do Pull ups!

The takeaway here is that pull ups (and chin ups) are compound exercises that have a ton of benefits to you, the user! Start working pull ups into your routine and start reaping the rewards.