The shrimp squat is a single-leg squat that builds lower body strength and improves joint mobility. The exercise primarily works the quads, glutes, hamstrings and calves… but it also requires good total body stability and balance, which engages the core too.
It has a couple of variations which provide opportunity for progression, as well as regression, helping anyone benefit from the movement.
In this exercise guide, we outline everything you need to know about shrimp squats, including how to perform them safely, muscles worked, benefits, things to consider and ultimately, who would benefit from doing them.
We also compare them to similar single-leg squat variations, such as pistol and Bulgarian squats, helping you decide which one to include in your next workout.
Strength, Balance and Mobility
The shrimp squat will test your strength, balance and joint mobility… making it a fantastic all-round movement to not only improve athletic performance, but also help make everyday activities easier too. It is quite a tricky movement though, but don’t worry if you can’t do it, we’ve included lots of tips in this guide to help beginners get started.
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What is the Shrimp Squat?
The shrimp squat is a single leg squat variation that involves the non-working leg to be placed behind your body. You can either hold your non-working leg with one hand or extend both arms in front during the squat.
The exercise requires you to squat down on one leg, until the knee of your non-working leg touches the floor.
It is popular in functional workouts like CrossFit, and calisthenics/bodyweight workouts.
Due to your leg being held behind you (instead of extended in front like the more common pistol squat), the movement actually feels almost like a lunge, and shares a lot of the biomechanics of the Bulgarian squat.
The “hands-free” variation (which includes both hands extended in front of you) is better for beginners, as it allows you to slowly test your balance, by gently lifting your foot off the ground with your back leg. As you get more confident, you can lift this higher until you’re ready to hold it.
Squat Variations for the Quads
Our guide on the best squat variations for the quads includes other exercises to include alongside the shrimp squat, for those looking to focus on their quads.
How to Perform the Shrimp Squat
Variation 1 – The Hands-Free Version
To do the Hands-Free Shrimp Squat:
- Stand with your back straight, shoulders over hips, legs straight and arms by your sides.
- Contract your glutes to prepare for a squat.
- Stretch both arms at 90° to your shoulders.
- Bend your right leg at 90°.
- Slowly squat down, bending at the hip, knee and ankle of your standing left leg and keeping your back as straight as possible and right knee at 90°.
- Lower your body as far as you can, controlling the pelvic position (ideally so the knee of your non-working leg touches the floor).
- Use your arms to keep your balance.
- Pause briefly at the bottom of the movement and hold for 3 seconds.
- Begin the upward movement by pushing up from your standing leg.
- As you reach the vertical position, keep your chest high, squeeze your glutes and allow your ankle, knee and hip to straighten.
- Repeat for repetitions.
- Repeat action this time with your right leg as the standing leg.
Coach’s Tip – If you’re struggling with ankle mobility during shrimp squats, try using a slant board (also known as “heel raised squats”, similar to cyclist squats) to decrease the range of motion at the ankles. Over time, you can use a lower gradient until your foot is flat. Taking the time to include ankle mobility exercises during your week will also really help with this and most lower body exercises.
Getting Started with Single Leg Squats
If you’ve never done single-leg squats before, ease into things nice and slowly. You may find doing exercise like regular squats, lunges and deficit reverse lunges are useful to practice to get used to the strength and stability needed to perform this sort of movement.
Variation 2 – The Hand-On Version
To do the Hand-On Shrimp Squat:
- Stand with your back straight, shoulders over your hips, legs straight and arms by your sides.
- Contract your glutes to prepare for a squat.
- Bend your right leg and grab the ankle with your right hand.
- Stretch out your left arm at 90° to your shoulder.
- Slowly squat down, bending at the hip, knee and ankle of your standing left leg and keeping your back as straight as possible.
- Lower your body as far as you can, controlling the pelvic position (ideally so the knee of your non-working leg touches the floor).
- Pause briefly at the bottom of the movement and hold for 3 seconds.
- Begin the upward movement by pushing up from your standing leg.
- As you reach the vertical position, keep your chest high, squeeze your glutes and allow your ankle, knee and hip to straighten.
- Repeat this for repetitions.
- Repeat action this time with your right leg as the standing leg.
Assisted Shrimp Squats
For both shrimp squat variations, you can also hold an object with your extended hand to help with your balance. This is a great way for beginners to get started with single-leg squats. Similarly, a TRX suspension trainer could also be useful.
Shrimp Squat Progression
If you want to make the shrimp squat more challenging, there are a number of things you can do.
Firstly, try holding your back leg with both hands. This makes balance and stability even more challenging. This is great for those who really want to develop their balance training.
Another way to make shrimp squats more challenging would be to do deficit shrimp squats. This would involve standing on a raised surface so that the knee of your non-working leg can go beyond the floor. This increases the range of motion of the exercise.
For those looking to really take shrimp squats to the next level, goblet shrimp squats would involve holding a kettlebell or dumbbell in front of you for added resistance. This makes the exercise similar to skater squats.
Be careful if you are adding additional weight to an exercise like shrimp squats though and take things nice a slowly.
Muscles Worked
The shrimp squat will work several sets of muscle groups, including the quads, glutes, hamstrings, calves, adductors, abductors and abdominals.
If you hold your non-working leg, it can also stretch out your quads and ankles too.
Benefits of Shrimp Squats
Strengthen Lower Body
The shrimp squat is an effective way to activate and strengthen the quads, glutes, hamstrings and calves.
As with all single-leg squats, this exercise provides the chance to improve strength and power in the lower body. This can help support athletic performance as well as daily activities.
Quad Focus
Further down in this article, we provide a more direct comparison between shrimp squats and pistol squats. One of the subtle differences is the change in how the lower body muscles are activated.
Pistol squats involve placing your weight on your heels with a big range of motion, which puts more focus on the glutes. In contrast, the shrimp squat involves placing your weight on the balls of your feet with a smaller range of motion, which puts more focus on the quads.
This makes shrimp squats a better single-leg variation for those looking to focus on their quad activation.
Easier to Adapt and Modify Compared to Pistol Squats
Pistol squats are a fantastic functional exercise… but they are tough… and they’re tough to adapt for beginners.
In contrast, shrimp squats are better suited to beginners as you can naturally work your way up to perfecting them.
You can simply start with static lunges and then slowly lift your back foot up to test your balance. Over time, you can keep this back foot raised for longer and longer… until you’re performing a shrimp squat.
Unilateral Training
It’s really useful to include some type of unilateral training in your workouts. From b stance deadlifts to single leg RDLs, unilateral strength helps to combat muscular imbalances, as well as improving balance and stability.
Similar Biomechanics with Sports
The conventional squat is a great exercise, that is ideal for building lower body strength… but very few sports or activities involve such a strict movement path.
Running, soccer, tennis, basketball… you can name any sport… the movement patterns are usually less predictable and need athletes to be adaptable.
Working on single-leg squats helps to develop that adaptable strength that is needed in sports.
Identify Poor Joint Mobility (Hips, Ankles and Knees)
As well as being a bodyweight strengthening exercise, the shrimp squat can be used as a test by strength and conditioning coaches and Physical Therapists to help identify poor joint mobility, muscle weaknesses and balance issues.
Improves Hip and Ankle Mobility
The deliberate movement of this exercise focuses attention on improving mobility around the hips and ankles. Poor mobility can be a limiting factor and illustrate how tightness in these joints influence movement paths and biomechanics.
Provides a Convenient Home Workout
This exercise is easy to incorporate in a home workout routine as no extra equipment is required.
We would tend to include it into mobility style workouts as opposed to a HIIT or strength routine. This is so you can focus on a slow and controlled movement.
Shrimp Squat Vs Pistol Squat Vs Bulgarian Squat
The shrimp, pistol and Bulgarian squats are all single-leg squat variations that help to build unilateral strength and balance. To do any of them, but particularly the shrimp and pistol squat, you need a good existing level of lower body strength and joint mobility (hips, knees and ankles).
However, although they are all defined as single-leg variations, they are suited to quite different workout programs as discussed below.
The shrimp squat shares more similarities with the Bulgarian squat than the pistol squat. This is because the non-working leg is placed backwards as opposed to extended in front.
This means the shrimp and Bulgarian squats share the same movement pattern and are more quad dominant squat variations.
The pistol squat, in contrast, puts the weight on your heel and is more glute dominant.
The pistol squat also requires better ankle and hip mobility due to the larger range of motion… and this makes it a more challenging exercise for most people and consequently often reserved for quite experienced athletes.
If you don’t have very good balance, the Bulgarian squat is perhaps your best choice, as it requires less balance and stability (because your back leg is resting on a surface).
Beginner? Stick with Shrimp and Bulgarian Squats
Pistol squats have gained a lot of popularity and attention, but they really are a tricky move if you’re a beginner. Sticking with shrimp and Bulgarian squats will help ensure you build up the strength and balance needed first, before you attempt to perform more advanced bodyweight exercises like the pistol squat.
Things to Consider
As a single-leg squat exercise, the main consideration is to work several key muscle groups to maintain balance without causing damage to ankles, knees and hips.
The movements involved in the shrimp squat should be performed slowly to develop the techniques and skills to establish the required level of strength and mobility. Variation 1 (hands-free) means that your arms can be used for better maintenance of balance. Variation 2 (hand-on) builds on this for core strength and greater mobility.
It is always advisable to pay special attention with ankles, knees and calves when performing balance exercises. Remember to test the stability of the joints when lifting the other leg off the ground. If there is any pain in the ankle, knee or calf, you should stop the exercise immediately.
With the vertical movement involved in the exercise, it is important to try and keep your back as straight as possible during this motion too.
If you are struggling with the traditional air squat (both legs) then it’s probably a wise idea to give single-leg variations a miss until you feel more confident in your squats.
Bottom Line
Shrimp squats are a fantastic way to engage several key muscle groups that will help to improve strength and mobility in the lower body. To reap the benefits from the exercise, you should always focus on proper technique and form in performing the movement.
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