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A plié squat is a powerful exercise that strengthens your legs, glutes, and calves while increasing the range of motion in your hips.
This lower body move tones your inner thighs while targeting your hamstrings and glutes, the strongest and most powerful muscles in your butt.
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Plié Squat Instructions:
Here’s how to do a plié squat:
- Stand with feet slightly wider than shoulder distance apart and toes turned out at a 45-degree angle.
- Bend your knees and lower your torso, keeping your back straight and abs tight.
- Squeeze your glutes and come to a standing position.
Targets: glutes, quads, hamstrings
If you would like to amp up your workout, try this plié v-raise instead. It adds weights to increase the intensity of the plié squats and work the upper body for additional muscle gain.
Benefits of Plié Squats
Plié squats are an easy way to tone your inner thighs, strengthen your glutes, and improve balance. They are also convenient and can be done anywhere.
Work Your Inner Thighs
Because of the different placement of your feet in a plié squat versus a regular squat, you are utilizing different muscles and opening your hips. When you move your legs into that plié stance, you really tone your adductor muscles or inner thighs.
After doing a few sets of plié squats, you’ll definitely start to feel it in your inner thighs.
Strengthen Your Glutes
By changing up the stance of your squat into a plié squat, you also work your gluteus maximus (the largest muscle in your body) more effectively.
Glute strength is essential not only for daily functions but also to make you a better runner and improve your athletic performance in virtually any type of workout you do. Doing plié squats can help you strengthen and tone your glute muscles, helping you create a firmer, more lifted butt.
If that’s your main goal, you might like my bubble butt exercise guide!
Improve Balance and Stability
Because plié squats take their name and stance from ballet, it’s no surprise that they can help improve your balance. To do a plié squat, you are putting your body into a whole new stance that you’re probably not used to, with your feet turned out at a 45-degree angle, and this does require a bit of balance.
You’ll increase your stability throughout your core and lower body as you do more plié squats, too.
They’re Easy To Do Anytime, Anywhere
Another great benefit of plié squats is that they don’t require any equipment. You only need your own body weight and a little bit of space. You can do them at home, at the gym, or even while traveling in your hotel room.
Easy Ways to Incorporate Plié Squats Into Your Workouts
There are several ways you can incorporate plié squats into your workout, including within your warm-up or added to a lower body workout.
Here are a few sample workouts to get you started:
Workout Method #1: Use Plié Squats In Your Warm-Ups
Plié squats are a great move to use in a quick warm-up for your workout. They help to:
- Lubricate the joints and prepare them for more movement
- Get your heart rate up, which helps prepare your body for your workout
- Get the blood pumping and circulating in all parts of your body
- Warm up the muscles in your glutes, hamstrings, quads, and inner thighs
Try one of these three ideas to incorporate plié squats into your warm-up routine.
| Warm-Up Idea #1: | 10 plié squats, 10 hip circles, 10 plié squats, 10 arm circles |
| Warm-Up Idea #2: | 30 seconds of mountain climbers, 30 seconds of butt-kicks, 10 plié squats, 10 lunges. |
| Warm-Up Idea #3: | 5 push-ups, 10 hip circles, 10 plié squats, 5 push-ups |
Workout Method #2: Use Plié Squats In Lower-Body Workouts
Plié squats are very effective for toning the lower body, resulting in a much tighter and lifted butt, and lean, toned legs. Here are two different quick bodyweight workouts you can do at home that don’t require any equipment.
Do either of these workouts 2-3 times per week to start toning your lower body:
| Leaner Legs Workout: | 10 plié squats, 10 cross-behind lunges, 10 leg lifts, 10 single-leg hamstring bridges. Do 1 minute of jumping jacks and 1 minute of mountain climbers. Repeat this cycle 3 times. |
| Legs And Buns Workout: | 10 plié squats, 10 jump squats, 10 glute bridges, 10 fire hydrants. Do 1 minute of butt kicks and 1 minute of mountain climbers. Repeat this cycle 3 times. |
