Barbells, Dumbbells or Machines: What Should I Use As A Beginner?

I was inspired to write this article following many of the inevitable gym conversations that come each time I exchange instagrams with someone I’ve met while travelling: “I go to the gym too but I don’t do what you do”.

What does that even mean “I don’t do what you do.”

I know what they mean. They don’t powerlift and they haven’t been barbell training for as long as I have. What I would love them to understand though is that what we do is not that different. You squat with a dumbbell? We both squat. You use some free weights and some machines? Same.

We both resistance train. We both apply external load to our body and aim to get stronger by lifting weights that are increasingly heavy. The details beyond that are just minutiae. We do the same thing, with minor differences.

You can get stronger, you can get more jacked and you can change the shape of your body with any one or combination of barbells, dumbbells or machines. Which will be most suitable for you to use will depend on a number of factors like:

• Your skill level,

• The specific goals of your training,

• The equipment you have access to,

• The support you have access to (like a coach, personal trainer or more advanced training partner) and

• Your total training volume

Let’s unpack the impact these variables will have.

Your skill level.

Machines look complex, but actually for the most part they require a very low level of skill. Most machines only move in one direction, and where you sit and where you place your hands is typically very obvious.

Free weights (barbells and dumbbells) have a much higher skill requirement to execute exercises in such a way that they are effective in training your muscles. Most gym goers can perform something that resembles a squat using a barbell or dumbbell; but a vast majority do not execute them in such a way that is both effective and safe.

Now, this is not to say that as a beginner you shouldn’t be using free weights. When I coach beginner lifters, I program a combination of barbell, dumbbell and machine based work. For a beginner:

Barbell exercises: are there to start teaching them the skills of barbell training. The loads will be very light and the exercises are prescibed with the primary goal of skill acquisition. They aren’t there as muscle building exercises (yet). They are just there for learning.

Dumbbell and machine exercises: these are my muscle builders at this early training stage. Because of the lower skill requirement, I can push these exercises heavier and harder, while it is not quite safe nor useful to do so with a barbell yet.

I prescribe barbell exercises at the start of each session as they’ll require the most focus and cognitive strain. I want the beginner lifter to be fresh to tackle the frustration of learning a new skill. Then because the barbell training won’t be overly fatiguing, the lifter will still be relatively fresh to push some hard dumbbell and machine work later in their session.

The specific goals of your training.

If your goal is to be a powerlifter, at some point you’re gonna have to deadlift.

If your goal is to grow a bigger booty however and you have absolutely no interest at all in developing proficiency in the barbell lifts, the most efficient and direct path to achieving this may well be via predominantly machine based exercises. This will minimise time spent / “wasted” in learning skills that you don’t care for, and you can instead move almost straight in to hard/heavy training with machines that are easy to learn.

If your primary goal is to grow a bigger booty but you also would like to learn how to squat and deadlift, then a combination of free weights and machine weights make sense (as above). Learn the barbell lifts and get your hard grunt work in via machines while you develop your proficiency with a barbell. Then once you’re more competent, you can use compound barbell movements (like squats and deadlifts) to move you towards your goal of muscle growth — thereby killing two birds with one stone and moving you towards two goals via the same exercises.

The equipment you have access to.

This is quite the obvious one but it bears mentioning. If you only have access to barbells, you should probably barbell train. If you only have access to machines, you should probably learn to train with those. Don’t bother wasting energy and emotion on what you don’t have access to. You can get a great session in with any one of barbells, dumbbells or machines. You may just need to be more creative!

A case study: in November last year John Paul and I visited Port Campbell Surf Life Saving Club to teach their rowing teams how to resistance train. As a regional surf club, they don’t have access to a stack of funding for a state of the art gym, and so most of the equipment they train on is old and mismatched and there is not a heap of it. We taught them how to squat using weight plates as goblets and how to Romanian deadlift with some small barbells that they had. We didn’t know what equipment they had when we arrived, but it didn’t matter. Whatever they had access to, we would teach them how to use it to resistance train with the objective of having their gym-based training support their rowing. What you use is much less important than how you use it; and you can write a great program with very little equipment!

The support you have access to.

A coach or personal trainer is going to speed up your rate of skill acquisition in the more complex barbell and dumbbell exercises. For someone with a coach available, I’ll prescribe almost entirely free weight exercises, as a way to speed up the learning process.

For someone going through training alone, more machine or dumbbell based work may be suitable, so that they feel like they are still doing productive training over the course of what will likely be a longer and slower learning process. Importantly, if you are without a coach and want to learn to barbell train then you should absolutely still include free weights training in your program, and still at the start of your session so you can strain your way through learning.

(Hot tip: film your exercises and watch them back between sets so you can critique yourself promptly. This will speed up the learning process!)

Your total training volume.

Generally, the more training volume you’re doing, the more you’re going to need to use some dumbbells or machines in your training. Barbell training is taxing. As a powerlifter, I squat, deadlift, Romanian deadlift and lunge with a barbell. All of those exercises load the muscles of my upper and lower back in some way. My back gets tireeeeed from training, no matter how well I perform those exercises. So in order to get through more training, at some point I am better off training with machines or dumbbells, that can isolate specific muscles a little better. If my back is tired, I can machine leg extension, machine leg curl, cable kick back, dumbbell hip thrust and so on with little to no loading of my back. When I hit my limit of how much barbell training I can get through in a week, I can likely still squeeze out some more productive training with machines or dumbbells.

Perhaps rather than asking “which should I use as a beginner”, the better questions to ask are:

• What are my goals for training in the long term?

• What equipment do I have access to right now?

• Do I have someone to teach me, or will I be self-teaching?

• What will make my training most enjoyable?

Then use the above as a matrix to help you craft your program.

Or meet with one our coaches. Your first trial at TSF is free of charge and obligation. Even if you hate it, we can teach you a lot in an hour 😉