Let’s face it. Big traps are intimidating and cool. They round off a powerful physique. You can’t have a jacked upper body and have deflated upper traps. Massive deltoids look silly when they’re next to tiny traps.

When people think of building their traps, they always think of shrugs. When I ask for any other exercise for their traps they… shrug… Shrugs are great but that’s way too limiting. Here are the best exercises to build massive traps.

First, some important anatomy

The traps are comprised of three parts: the upper, middle, and lower trapezius. They form a large and triangular muscle that extends from the the back of the skull, neck, shoulder blade, and down to the mid back. While most people focus on the upper trap, you need to build the entire muscle to fully round out the back physique.

Most of the exercises here may emphasize the upper traps but I will also include some that will hit the middle and lower traps as well.

Clean pulls and high pulls

If you’ve watched Olympic weightlifting or a football team train, you’ve probably seen a clean. This is when an individual starts with the bar on the floor similar to a deadlift, and brings it onto their shoulder in a single motion.

A clean pull or high pull is essentially a clean without the catching phase. Instead of focusing on catching the bar at the front of the shoulders, you focus on powerfully shrugging and pulling the bar up as high as possible. You can start these from the floor or the hang position.

A high pull is a pull that focuses on getting the bar up to chest or shoulder height.

A clean pull is a pull that uses heavier weights and focuses on getting the bar up to waist height.

These exercises work the entire trap since you need to maintain tension and stability in the shoulder blades during the entire lift, but the top shrug and pull are unmatched upper trap builders.

Deadlifts and variations

When done correctly, deadlifts should be working the entire upper back. While you don’t need to pull your shoulders back all the way, which would be awkward, there needs to be some level of tension.

This is especially true of Romanian deadlifts and stiff legged deadlifts. Your shoulder blades need to stay rock solid with tension in the entire upper back and lats during the entire lift. Your upper back should be pumped and sore along with the rest of your body.

Farmer walk/carries

When you’re holding something heavy in your hands, the traps are the main muscle preventing your arms from falling off of your spine. This is best exemplified in farmer carries.

The level of trap tension and stability that is required for farmer carries is unmatched by most exercises. As you’re wobbling around, the perturbations caused by each step is more load that demands the traps to work harder.

We don’t need to look much further than the sport of strongman to appreciate what farmer carries can do. This is a staple exercise and those athletes have some of the biggest traps on earth.

It doesn’t get much simpler than this. Grab a pair of heavy things (dumbbells, kettlebells, buckets, or specialized farmer carry handles) and start walking. Make sure you maintain tension and stability in your shoulders and traps.

Of course, shrugs

No article about traps would be complete without the bodybuilding staple. Next to the farmer carries, this is also a very simple exercise to do. Grab a pair of heavy weights and pull your shoulders up to your ears.

A common technical fault here is to jut your face forward like a pigeon with each rep. Don’t do that. It looks silly and develops bad habits.

A better way to do these is the way bodybuilding legend Dorian Yates suggests. Everything stays the same except you bend forward at the hips a little bit and shrug a bit backwards as well as upwards. I recommend holding it for a hot second or two and slowly letting it down.

The full picture

A well-rounded program for the traps wouldn’t be complete if we neglect other exercises that hit the middle and lower traps as well as the rest of the upper back.

Face pulls

The face pull is a great exercise that essentially hits the entire upper back except for the lats. The entire trap, rear delts, external rotators, and rhomboids will be worked here.

Rows

Wanna grow? You gotta row! You don’t need to keep your shoulder blade anchored back the entire time but maintain some tension in the traps as you do this. And slow that shit down. There’s no sense in rushing through rows. Control the ascent, pause briefly, and slow the descent.

I’ve been incorporating high reps with rows lately. My back is pumped to new levels when I do bent over rows with 205 lbs for a few sets of 15 reps.

Overhead presses

A lot of people forget that the upper traps are upwards rotators, meaning they assist in the upward rotation motion of the shoulder blades. A slight top shrug at the top of the overhead press is the normal way the shoulders move.

Get growing

The traps aren’t just aesthetic additions to the body. Strong upper, middle, and lower traps are essential to shoulder health.

A lot of physical therapists, chiropractors, and trainers will label the upper trap as a problematic muscle because it tends to be painful in a lot of people. This is untrue. Most of these individuals have pain in their upper trap because the rest of the scapular muscles such as the middle traps, lower traps, and serratus anterior are weak.

Strong traps are not the problem. It’s that all of the other muscles are just weak.

The nuances of shoulder health and trap pain are a topic for another article. For now, let’s go get jacked.