How to Increase Vertical Jump: 10 Exercises and an 8-Week Plan

You've probably tried to jump higher before. Maybe you followed a jump program from a video, did hundreds of jumps a week, or added squats with no real plan. A few weeks later the mark on the wall hadn't moved, and the rim looked just as far away as it did on day one.

That's discouraging, because it feels like proof that you're simply not a jumper. Plenty of people decide their vertical was fixed at birth and stop trying to change it.

A stuck vertical is usually a program problem, not a genetics problem. The common mistakes are too many sloppy jumps on tired legs, no strength work behind them, and no test to show what's working. This guide fixes all three. You get technique you can use today, 10 exercises for a higher vertical, the strength training that makes them work, an 8-week plan with sets and reps, and a simple way to measure your jump at home.

How to Jump Higher Right Away: Fix Your Technique

Technique is the fastest gain because it uses strength you already have. Two parts of a standing jump matter most. In a force-platform study of 18 men, Harman and colleagues (1990) found that both the quick dip before the jump and the arm swing raised jump height, and that the arm swing did more.

Swing your arms hard

Stand tall with your arms at your sides. As you dip, swing both arms down and back past your hips. Then drive them up hard as you push off, as if you were throwing your hands at the ceiling. In a biomechanics study by Lees and colleagues (2004), people jumped 8.6 cm (about 3.4 inches) higher with an arm swing than without one. About 72 percent of that gain came from leaving the ground faster, and 28 percent from taking off with the body in a higher position.

Dip fast and don't pause at the bottom

Drop into your squat and reverse straight away. A pause at the bottom costs height. Bobbert and colleagues (1996) found that six volleyball players jumped 3.4 cm higher with a countermovement, the quick dip, than from a paused squat, even when they started the push from the same position. Their explanation is that the dip lets your leg muscles build up force before they start to shorten. Try a few dip depths and keep the one that gives your best mark on the wall.

Practice your run-up if your sport has one

Basketball and volleyball players usually jump after a few steps, and the run-up is a skill of its own. Rehearse it at walking pace first, then at full speed, and keep the same hard arm swing you use from a standing start. Measure it separately from your standing jump, because the two numbers aren't comparable.

Land softly so you can jump again

Land on the balls of your feet and let your heels come down, with your knees bent, your knees in line with your toes and your hips pushed back. A good landing is quiet. It protects your knees, and it's also the first half of every rebound jump, so the plan below trains it from week 1.

10 Exercises for a Higher Vertical Jump

Plyometric exercises are jumps and hops in which your muscles and tendons stretch and then contract fast, like a spring. Strength exercises build the force behind them. Exercises 1 to 6 below are plyometric and use your body weight only. Exercises 7 to 10 build strength with dumbbells. Keep every jump at body weight: a 2009 meta-analysis by Sáez de Villarreal and colleagues found no extra benefit from adding weight to plyometric jumps.

1. Countermovement jump

This one is both the training and the test. Stand tall, dip fast, swing your arms and jump as high as you can, then land softly and reset your feet. Every rep is a maximal effort, so take 10 to 20 seconds between reps and 1 to 2 minutes between sets. Reaching for a target, like a leaf on a branch or a chalk mark on a wall, makes each jump count.

2. Jump squat

Squat until your thighs are about parallel to the floor, jump, land softly and flow straight into the next rep. Unlike the countermovement jump, the reps run together, so it trains you to rebound. End the set when a landing gets loud or your knees drift inward. Our jump squats page covers the form, the common mistakes and easier versions.

3. Pogo hops

Keep your knees nearly straight and bounce a few inches off the floor on the balls of your feet, touching down as briefly as you can. Pogo hops teach your ankles and Achilles tendons to act like stiff springs, so each takeoff happens faster. Our guide to calf exercises at home shows how they fit with calf raises for stronger lower legs.

4. Broad jump

Swing your arms, jump forward as far as you can and stick the landing on both feet. The broad jump loads your hips harder than a vertical jump does. Horizontal jumps still raise your vertical: an umbrella review of 29 meta-analyses by Kons and colleagues (2023) lists one in which horizontal jump training improved vertical jump height about as much as vertical jump training did.

5. Lateral bound

Push off your right leg, jump sideways and land on your left leg only. Hold that landing for a second, then bound back. Lateral bounds build single-leg power and teach your knee to stay in line with your toes when you land on one foot. Once the landings are steady, link the bounds together without the pause.

6. Drop jump

Stand on a low step or the bottom stair, about 20 to 30 cm high. Step off rather than jumping off, land on both feet and spring straight back up as fast as you can, keeping your time on the ground short. This is the most intense drill on the list, so the plan saves it for weeks 6 to 8, after five weeks of clean landings.

7. Goblet squat

Hold one dumbbell upright against your chest, squat as deep as you can with your heels down and your chest up, and stand up fast. Lower slowly and rise quickly on every rep. When 10 reps get easy with your heaviest dumbbell, make Bulgarian split squats your main squat. Our goblet squats page covers the setup in detail.

8. Bulgarian split squat

Rest the top of your back foot on a bench or step behind you, hold a dumbbell in each hand and lower until your back knee nearly touches the floor, then drive up through your front foot. Your front leg now carries most of the load, so the same dumbbells feel far heavier than they do in a goblet squat. The Bulgarian split squat page shows how far to stand from the bench.

9. Dumbbell Romanian deadlift

Hold the dumbbells in front of your thighs, push your hips back with a slight bend in your knees until you feel a stretch in your hamstrings, then drive your hips forward to stand tall. Every jump ends with a hard hip extension, and this is the exercise in the plan that trains it with load.

10. Single-leg calf raise

Stand on one foot on a step, lower your heel below the edge, then rise as high as you can. Hold a dumbbell in the hand on the same side once 12 reps get easy. Stronger calves and Achilles tendons handle the pogo hops and drop jumps better and push harder at the end of every takeoff.

Strength Training for Vertical Jump: Do Squats Help?

Yes, squats help, most of all if you aren't strong yet. Jump height depends on how fast you leave the ground. That speed comes from how much force you push into the floor, relative to your body weight, in the split second before takeoff. In a force-plate study of 273 college and professional athletes, Laffaye and colleagues (2014) found that the force of the push-off and how quickly force built up during the dip were the measures most closely tied to jump height.

Getting stronger raises that force. In a 10-week trial, Cormie and colleagues (2010) randomly assigned 24 relatively weak men to one of three groups: heavy back squats at 75 to 90 percent of their one-rep max, explosive jump squats with light or no load, or no training. Both training groups trained three times a week. Peak power in the jump rose about 18 percent in both training groups. The heavy-squat group also gained 31 percent in squat strength, against 4.5 percent for the jump group, so the authors concluded that strength training is the more useful choice for relatively weak people.

Speed matters as well. A 2022 meta-analysis by Morris and colleagues found that weightlifting, the fast barbell lifts such as cleans and snatches, improved countermovement jump height more than traditional slower resistance training did (Hedges' g 0.95 across 9 studies). The difference between weightlifting and plyometrics wasn't significant. For home training that points to a simple split: dumbbell work that's heavy for you builds the force, and bodyweight jumps teach you to use it fast.

How to make dumbbell strength work heavy enough

The trials above used barbell squats at 75 to 90 percent of a one-rep max, and a pair of dumbbells can't always match that on two legs. Single-leg exercises close the gap, because a Bulgarian split squat puts most of your body weight plus the dumbbells on one leg. Pick a load you can lift for no more than 5 to 8 good reps, lower it under control and stand up fast. When you reach the top of the rep range on every set, go heavier.

Do you need power cleans or a barbell?

No. Power cleans and other weightlifting moves did well for jumping in the meta-analysis above, but they need coaching and a barbell, and plyometrics gave similar jump gains with no equipment. If you already train in a gym, coached cleans are a reasonable alternative to some of the jumps in this guide. The plan below doesn't need them.

How Much Can You Increase Your Vertical Jump?

Expect a few centimeters from training, plus whatever your technique was leaving on the table. Markovic's 2007 meta-analysis of plyometric trials put the average gain at about 5 to 10 percent, roughly 2 to 6 cm (0.8 to 2.4 inches) depending on the type of jump. Our review of plyometric training research answers whether plyometrics actually make you jump higher, with the percentages for each jump test and the number of sessions the biggest gains took.

Programs that build power can add more. In a second 10-week trial from Cormie's group (2010), 16 men did jump squats with light or no load three times a week, and their jump height rose 7 cm in the stronger men and 6 cm in the weaker men. Program length matters too. In a meta-analysis of 16 studies in female athletes, Stojanović and colleagues (2017) found that programs longer than 10 weeks had about three times the effect on countermovement jump height of shorter ones (effect size 1.87 against 0.58).

If you don't play a sport, the gain is smaller but still real. A meta-analysis of 25 studies in healthy adults by Oxfeldt and colleagues (2019) found a small-to-moderate improvement in jump height after 4 to 12 weeks of plyometric training.

A realistic target for the 8-week plan below is about 2 to 5 cm, or 1 to 2 inches, from the training itself. If you've been jumping without a real arm swing, fixing that could be worth more than the whole program.

The 8-Week Vertical Jump Training Plan

This vertical jump workout plan fits a living room, garage or backyard. It runs two sessions a week of about 40 minutes, with at least one rest day between them, such as Monday and Thursday. Each session starts with a warm-up, moves to the jumps while your legs are fresh, and finishes with strength work. Test your jump before week 1, at the end of week 4 and at the end of week 8.

• Warm up for 8 to 10 minutes. Our dynamic warm up routine works well before jumping. Save long static stretches for after the session.
• Make every jump a full effort. Rest 1 to 2 minutes between jump sets, and end a set early if your landings get loud or your knees cave in.
• Count your ground contacts. The plan builds from about 40 to 50 per session in weeks 1 and 2 to 70 to 80 in weeks 3 to 5, then drops back to 50 to 70 harder ones in weeks 6 to 8.
• Lift heavy for you. Choose a weight that leaves one or two reps in reserve at the top of the rep range. When you reach the top on every set, go heavier.
• Count your sport. If you play basketball or volleyball two or more times a week, keep the strength exercises and cut the jump sets in half.

Weeks 1 and 2: learn to land

Weeks 3 to 5: build power

Weeks 6 to 8: peak power

In week 8, drop one set from every exercise and test your jump two or three days after the last session, on fresh legs. Skip the drop jumps if your knees or Achilles tendons are sore, and do extra countermovement jumps instead. After the 8 weeks, repeat weeks 3 to 8 with heavier dumbbells and a new target mark on the wall.

If you'd rather have your sessions planned for you, a home workout app that needs no equipment can take that part off your plate. FitCraft's strength workouts use bodyweight and dumbbells, and your AI coach demonstrates each exercise on an interactive 3D model you can rotate and zoom. Workouts adjust as you progress, and streaks and calendar tracking help two sessions a week keep happening after the first burst of motivation fades.

How Often Should You Do Plyometrics?

Two plyometric sessions a week, with at least 48 hours between them, is enough for most people. In a 7-week drop-jump trial by de Villarreal and colleagues (2008), students who trained two days a week improved their jumping and sprinting about as much as a group that trained four days a week and did twice as many jumps.

Jumping in your sport counts toward that total. A basketball or volleyball practice already contains dozens of jumps, so in season one jump session a week plus your strength work is often plenty. Rest inside the session matters just as much: a max-effort jump needs a minute or two between sets to stay a max effort.

How to Measure Your Vertical Jump at Home

Measure your jump before you start so you'll know whether the plan is working. You need a wall, some chalk or a sticky note, and a friend or a phone.

The wall test

1. Warm up, then stand side-on to a wall with chalk on the fingertips of the hand nearest it.
2. Keep your feet flat, reach as high as you can and touch the wall to mark your standing reach.
3. From a standing start, dip, swing your arms and jump, touching the wall as high as you can.
4. Take three jumps with 30 to 60 seconds of rest and keep the highest mark.
5. Measure from your standing-reach mark to your highest mark. That distance is your vertical jump.

Test in the same shoes, on the same floor and after the same warm-up every time, so the numbers are comparable.

The phone video method

You can also time your jump. Film yourself from the side in slow motion, count the frames from the moment your toes leave the floor to the moment they touch down, and divide by the frame rate to get your flight time. At 240 frames per second, 120 frames of flight is 0.5 seconds. Your jump height in meters is 1.226 times the flight time squared, which works out to about 31 cm (12 inches) for 0.5 seconds. In a 2015 validation study by Balsalobre-Fernández and colleagues, jump heights calculated from flight time in high-speed phone video matched a force platform closely, with an average difference of about 1 cm. Land with your legs as straight as they were at takeoff, because tucking your knees stretches the flight time and inflates the number.

Why Can't I Jump Higher?

Most stuck verticals come down to one of five things.

• You jump on tired legs. Jumps tacked onto the end of a leg workout or a long practice are slow jumps. Put them first in the session.
• You aren't strong enough yet. If a goblet squat with a moderate dumbbell feels hard, strength work will probably raise your jump more than extra jumping will, which is what the heavy-squat trial above suggests.
• Your weight went up but your strength didn't. Jump height depends on force relative to body weight. Extra body fat lowers your jump, and extra muscle only helps if your force rises with it.
• You rarely jump at full effort. High-rep jump circuits build fitness, not height. A handful of maximal, fully rested jumps trains the skill.
• Your technique leaks height. A slow dip, a pause at the bottom or a lazy arm swing costs you centimeters on every jump.

What Are the Downsides of Plyometrics?

The main downside of plyometrics is tendon overload, especially in the patellar tendon just below the kneecap. In a study of 613 elite Norwegian athletes, Lian and colleagues (2005) found that 14.2 percent currently had jumper's knee, rising to 44.6 percent in volleyball and 31.9 percent in basketball, and symptoms had lasted 32 months on average. Those athletes jump far more than this plan asks, but the lesson carries over: jump volume needs a ceiling and rest days.

Sore calves and thighs in the first week or two are normal DOMS. Pain just below the kneecap or in the Achilles tendon that gets worse from one session to the next is different. Cut your jumps, keep the strength work, and see a physical therapist if it doesn't settle within a couple of weeks.

Jumping also isn't the right starting point for everyone. If you have knee, ankle or back pain, osteoporosis, are pregnant, or haven't exercised in a long time, check with a doctor or physical therapist first, and build strength with the dumbbell exercises before you add jumps.

The Bottom Line

How to increase vertical jump comes down to three things: a technique that uses a full arm swing and a quick dip, stronger legs, and a modest dose of max-effort jumps. Two sessions a week for 8 weeks, tested against a wall, is enough to see your jump change.

Your vertical isn't fixed. It responds to good training like everything else in your body does.