Bench Press Calculator

Enter the weight and reps of a bench press set you took to failure. The calculator gives your estimated one-rep max (1RM), the seven formulas behind it and your bench weights for 1 to 10 reps.

Bench press maxes from 135 to 315 lb

The loads below are a 45 lb bar with 45 lb and 25 lb plates, a common US plate set rather than a federation standard. Read across to your reps: benching 225 lb for 5 puts your estimated max at 259.9 lb.

What bench press studies measured

Reynolds et al. (2006) tested 70 adults, aged 18 to 69, on the flat barbell bench press with a 45 lb (22 kg) bar, plus 20 more to check their equations. As a share of the 1RM, the mean 5-rep max was 87.45%, the 10-rep max 75.65% and the 20-rep max 61.61%. The table sets the 5- and 10-rep means against the equations.

In a check on 20 further adults, Reynolds et al. rated their own equation and those of Brzycki and O'Connor et al. the most accurate for the bench press. Mayhew et al. (2008) tested 103 college women and found the equations more accurate when the set had fewer than 10 reps. The Mayhew et al. (1992) equation itself came from the bench press: as Reynolds et al. describe it, subjects did as many reps as they could in one minute with 55–95% of their 1RM.

IPF bench press rules in brief

In meets run under IPF rules, a bench press counts only if it follows these points (Technical Rulebook 2026, section 4.2):

• Head, shoulders and buttocks stay on the bench and the feet stay flat on the floor for the whole lift.
• The hands grip the bar with the thumbs around it, no more than 81 cm apart measured between the forefingers. A reverse grip is not allowed.
• After the lift-off, you wait with locked elbows for the "Start" signal.
• You lower the bar to the chest or abdomen until the underside of both elbows is level with or below the top of the shoulder joints. The bar must not touch the belt.
• You hold the bar motionless until the "Press" signal, press it to locked elbows and hold it there until "Rack".