Do You Need To Gain Weight To Grow Your Glutes?

Growing your booty will require minor and major tweaks here and there with your lifestyle, workouts, and most importantly your diet. One of the most commonly asked questions people ask when they want to grow their butt is “do you need to gain weight to grow your glutes”?

You don’t necessarily need to gain weight in order to grow your glutes, however, you do need to gain more muscle on your glutes to grow them which may result in weight gain. But keep in mind that gaining muscle weight will not make you look bigger. 

The answer is never really black and white, let’s go more in-depth to fully understand how gaining weight and growing your glutes are related. 

Do You Need To Gain Weight To Grow Glutes?

Let us start by discussing our body weight and how that works. So our weight is made up of many different components such as our fats, organs, water weight, fats, etc. You get the picture. 

When we gain weight is doesn’t necessarily mean we are gaining fat. It could sometimes mean we are gaining muscle. Muscle is denser than fat, which means muscle takes up less space as compared to fat. So a person with more muscles can weigh heavier compared to a person with less muscles and a higher body fat percentage. 

You need to grow your glute muscles in order to get a bigger butt, which means you may become heavier if you are gaining muscles. However, just because you’re gaining weight does not mean you will look thicker overall. If you follow the right diet plan and do the correct exercises, you can get build your butt muscles without looking bulky in other places of your body. 

The point being, you shouldn’t really focus on your scale weight, especially if your goal is to grow your butt. One of the best fitness tips is to use a measuring tape instead of a weight scale when tracking your booty progress. 

But what if you want to grow your butt while losing fat? Is that even possible?

If you are a beginner, meaning you haven’t worked out consistently for over 6 – 8 months, you can gain muscle and lose fat at the same time. You can achieve this by cleaning your diet, exercising regularly, and adding glute growing workouts to your fitness plan. People who have worked out regularly before but stopped for a significant amount of time, I’m talking years, also fall under this category.

But, if you’ve been working out consistently for a long period of time, you need to choose one or the other. If your goal is to gain muscle, you need to focus on that solely to achieve your goals. 

How To Grow Glutes Without Gaining Weight

So you want to grow your booty without gaining weight. Here are some things you can do to achieve just that!

Adjust Your Diet

Your diet will always play a big role when trying to achieve any kind of fitness goal. And growing your glutes is no exception. You must focus on consuming the right kind of food. Make sure you are getting enough protein, carbs, and fats. These are the macronutrients you need to get that booty you always wanted. Figuring out and consuming the right amount of protein, carbs, and fats your body needs is a game-changer! There are a ton of macronutrient calculators out there that can help you figure out how much you should be consuming. 

Ensure you are consuming mostly clean whole foods. This doesn’t mean you cannot have cheat meals here and there. Remind yourself to consume mostly clean healthy food to get you closer to your goal.

As long as you are consuming the right amount of macronutrients your body needs without going overboard on the calories you are consuming you should be able to grow your glutes without gaining excessive weight. 

Focus On Glute Activation And Glute Exercises

Glute activation is very important. Especially now that most of us are sitting down during school, or work. We rarely use our glute muscles, which is why we need to wake up our booty muscles before we do glute exercises. Glute activation workouts are like warm-up workouts for your butt, these workouts will help you get the most of your booty workout. 

Once you are done with your glute activation you can proceed to do your glute exercises, these are your hip thrusts, squats, deadlifts, and so on. If you want to see results faster, you can do glutes 3x a week. Keep in mind that you need rest days in between. You cannot work out the same muscle group for two or more days in a row. Muscles need rest in order to get stronger and thicker. 

Challenge Yourself

Doing the same exercises and the same set and reps will not make your booty grow. You need to challenge yourself in order for your glute muscles to actually get thicker. When you do the same workout over and over again your muscles will get used to the workouts and you will hit a plateau. That is why increasing the intensity of your workouts every 3-5 weeks is advisable. 

You can add more reps, more sets, or you can try adding resistance bands and weights. Adding extra tension using bands and weights can help immensely with growing your glutes as opposed to not adding weights.

Do Strength Training Not Just For Your Booty

In order to grow your booty without gaining weight or getting bigger on the other parts of your body, you must also do strength or resistance training all over. Don’t skip out on your arms, abs, back, and legs. It is important to keep them lean while you are trying to grow your butt. As long as you are not overconsuming calories, you shouldn’t worry about getting bulky. 

Incorporate Some Cardio

Cardio is a great type of exercise that can help you stay lean or even shed off a few pounds of excess fat. Try incorporating a few cardio sessions throughout your week. You can do 1 – 3 days of cardio throughout your week. Combining cardio with strength training can help you stay slim while growing your booty!

Foods To Eat To Grow Your Butt

Like I mentioned, food plays a big role in building your booty. Here are some of the best foods to eat when you are growing your glutes.

1. Salmon

Salmon is a great source of protein and healthy fat. The omega-3 fatty acids in salmon are excellent for reducing inflammation which means salmon is great for recovery!

2. Chicken Breast 

Chicken breast is high in protein! The protein from chicken can help you gain booty muscle while staying lean. The key to eating chicken breast is to season it well. Avoid too much salt, but a bit of seasoning and salt won’t hurt.

3. Nut butter or Nuts

Nuts and nut butter are also packed with protein and fats. Nuts are great sources of plant-based protein and are very versatile. You can add them to your toast, your fruits, and even your protein shakes!

4. Greek Yogurt

Say goodbye to regular sugar-filled yogurt you always see in the shops. Opt for Greek yogurt instead! Greek yogurt is high in essential proteins that are essential to gaining muscle. 

5. Avocados

Avocados are packed with healthy fats, fiber, and protein. Not only that, but they are also rich in vitamin b6, vitamin c, magnesium, and potassium. A single avocado is also filled with antioxidants that can help you with muscle recovery and soreness. 

7. Protein Shakes

It is a well-known fact that in order to grow muscles, you must consume a good amount of protein. Sometimes consuming a ton of protein while trying to not take in too many calories is hard. This is why protein shakes are great! Protein shakes and powders can help you consume more protein without overconsuming calories. A scoop of protein powder is around 120 – 200 calories and 20 – 30 grams of protein. 

Don’t worry protein powders and shakes won’t make you bulky. It’s just a supplement to help people consume more protein.

8. Eggs

Eggs are also great sources of high-quality protein. You don’t have to consume just the egg whites like how some people do it. Consuming the whole egg helps with better protein synthesis. 

9. Cottage Cheese

Any food that is high in protein will help you a ton with growing your butt. This is why cottage cheese is also part of this list. Cottage cheese is packed with protein. One cup/210 grams of cottage cheese contains 22 grams of protein!

10. Milk

Milk is also beneficial to your booty gains. The amino acids in milk can help support protein synthesis when you drink it after your workout. A cup of milk contains 8 grams of protein. Why not try combining protein powder with milk for your post-workout drink?

Final Thoughts

You don’t have to gain weight to grow your glutes but gaining some muscle weight won’t hurt too! Just remind yourself that weight gain doesn’t always equate to gaining fat.