Essomio™

← All exercise guides

triceps

Parallel Dip Bar

Holding yourself up between two bars, you lower your body by bending your elbows and press back up. A hard bodyweight exercise for the triceps and chest.

advanceddip bars

Parallel Dip Bar, start position
START
Parallel Dip Bar, end position
END
BEFORE YOU START1
  1. Use bars about shoulder-width apart; wider shifts the work to the chest.
HOW TO DO IT

Get into position

  1. Grip the bars and jump or step up until your arms are straight.
  2. Bend your knees and cross your ankles behind you.
  3. Keep your body upright and look straight ahead. Lean slightly forward to work the chest more.

Check: Your arms are straight, your shoulders are down away from your ears, and your body hangs still between the bars.

Lower

  1. Bend your elbows and lower your body slowly, elbows pointing back.
  2. Stop when your upper arms are about level with the bars.

Check: Your elbows are bent to about a right angle and you feel a stretch in the chest, with no pinching in the shoulders.

Push up

  1. Push the bars down to straighten your arms again.

Check: Your arms are straight again at the top.

That is one rep. Repeat for your set.

Breathe out as you straighten in about 1 second; breathe in as you bend over 2 to 3 seconds.

MUSCLES WORKED
Parallel Dip Bar: muscles worked, front view
Parallel Dip Bar: muscles worked, back view

tricepsfront deltschest

Red marks the muscles doing the work; amber the assisting ones. Same body for every exercise, so guides compare at a glance.

COMMON MISTAKES3
  • Going too low. Over-stretches the front of the shoulder. Fix: Stop with your upper arms level with the bars.
  • Shoulders rising up to the ears at the top. Fix: Push your shoulders down as you straighten.
  • Swinging the legs to help. Fix: Keep your knees bent and still.
SAFETY2
  • Keep your wrists straight.
  • If you cannot do a full dip with control, start with bench dips or an assisted dip machine.
EQUIPMENT SETTINGS
  • dip bars · width: shoulder-width or a little wider
RELATED EXERCISES

easier: bench dips, push ups

variants: close grip bench press

© 2026 Essomio LLC. The illustrations, muscle charts and guide text on this page are works of Essomio LLC, all rights reserved. They are for your personal use and may not be copied, redistributed or used to train models without written permission — see Licensing.