How long does it take to get abs? Unfortunately, there is no definite answer to this question. 

Too many factors come into play, including genetics, lifestyle, and activity level. For example, one lifter with a lower body fat percentage may find achieving abs quickly. Someone with a higher body fat percentage will require more time and effort to reduce body fat and build abs. 

How long it takes you to get abs will uniquely differ from anyone else’s. Read this article to learn more about what factors can make or break your ab-building success. 

How Long Does It Take To Get Abs?

How long does it take to get abs if you work out every day? Working out every day can hinder progress as the body needs time to rest and recover to grow stronger. If not given the appropriate recovery time, it can raise the risk of injury, fatigue, dehydration, and mental health concerns. 

Other Influencing Factors

How long does it take to build abs? Other influencing factors can determine this. Considering these factors can help lifters enhance progress and prioritize patience and perseverance to achieve this goal. 

Genetics

More than a few lifters desperately aim to achieve your aesthetic goals of a chiseled body and defined abs. Unfortunately, this isn’t an easy task for a multitude of reasons, one of them being genetics. 

Genetics refers to human traits passed down from generation to generation. Our genes carry these traits, including appearance, likelihood of getting certain diseases, and fat distribution (how we carry fat). This is why everyone reacts differently to different foods and workout plans, the same as why fat and muscle are carried uniquely. 

Although we can’t change our genetics, we can work with them to better understand our body’s processes and adaptations. Building abs will take longer if you have a slow metabolism and carry more fat in your trunk area. In comparison, if you have a fast metabolism and build muscle easily, you may find an easier time building abs. 

Working with rather than against how your body works can build a better understanding and more efficient training process. If you have a slow metabolism and need to lose belly fat, you must watch what you eat. Compared to someone with a fast metabolism, you will need to consume less food to discourage weight gain. 

Learning how to speed up your metabolism, increase energy expenditure, and enter a caloric deficit can be beneficial. No matter the genetics, implementing these strategies can produce fat loss and decrease body fat percentage. How this process looks and how much time is needed to achieve abs will change per individual. 

Diet

One of the most important factors that can influence your success in building abs is diet. What you eat and how you eat can drastically determine whether you maintain, lose, or gain fat and muscle. 

A person’s body fat percentage, the fat-to-lean tissue ratio, can affect whether abs are hidden or revealed. If a person’s body fat percentage is too high, it can mean the abdominal muscles are covered up by fat. Eating more than your body needs, known as a caloric surplus, causes weight and fat gain. 

Occasionally, lifters will enter a caloric surplus, more than your body needs, to purposely increase muscle mass. Conversely, other lifters may enter a caloric deficit, less than your body needs, to encourage weight or fat loss. In both diet strategies, lifters enforce macronutrient targets, including protein, to maintain muscle mass and support recovery. 

Body Fat Percentage

Entering a caloric deficit can help lifters with higher body fat percentages decrease fat to build abs. While in this caloric deficit, lifters must prioritize a high-protein diet to preserve lean body mass and decrease fat mass. Caloric deficits are not designed to be long-term as they can have repercussions on health, like nausea and fatigue. 

What body fat percentage should you aim for as a lifter wanting to build abs? The general guidelines are as follows:

• Females — 14-20%
• Males — 6-13%

As a reminder, genetics play a vital role in what this looks like for each lifter. The ideal body fat percentage to show abs can look different per person. The above is a recommended guideline for lifters to observe what body fat percentage is appropriate to achieve abs. 

How we carry fat, also known as fat distribution, is greatly determined by genetics. One woman may carry more weight in her thighs, while another may carry more in her trunk area. This means the woman who carries more fat in her trunk area will have to work harder to shed fat.

Ab-Building Tips 

Want to know some helpful ab-building tips to make your fitness journey easier? Check out these informational guidelines, from entering a caloric deficit to increasing energy expenditure to build abs efficiently.  

Enter A Caloric Deficit

A caloric deficit is eating less or burning more calories than you consume. An example of this would be consuming 1,500 calories but burning 2,000 calories. This would mean you are in a 500-calorie deficit. 

No caloric deficit will look the same for each individual. Different factors can determine how many calories your body needs to function smoothly, including:

• Gender.
• Height.
• Age.
• Activity level.
• Current weight.

Different caloric calculators are available that consider these factors to determine how many calories your body needs. They can be used to evaluate calories needed for healthy functioning and to determine a caloric deficit. 

There are different types of caloric deficits depending on how fast you want to lose weight or fat. It’s generally recommended for lifters to enter a sustainable caloric deficit to promote success and deter issues like eating disorders. A 500-calorie deficit is a healthy range to consider for sustainability. 

Increase Energy Expenditure

Another component that coincides with a caloric deficit is to increase energy expenditure. This is often done through exercise to increase activity levels and energy expended to create a larger caloric deficit. 

Physical activity has many classifications, including resistance training, yard work, walking, dancing, etc. Increasing your energy expenditure is beneficial in helping you burn more calories than you consume to promote fat loss. Incorporating resistance training is especially important as it helps burn calories, speeds up the metabolism, and maintains lean muscle mass.

These benefits are productive for supporting efforts to lose fat, maintain lean muscle, and build abs.  

Prioritize Mind-To-Muscle Connection

While on your fitness journey to achieving abs, it’s important to remember that different components can affect muscle engagement. Using productive techniques like mind-to-muscle connection can drastically improve muscle engagement. In abdominal exercises, this would look like thinking of specifically using the core muscles to enable the movement pattern. 

Attempt to prioritize this technique to improve muscle engagement in the abdominal muscles. This can help build strength and muscle to achieve abs. 

Use Various Core Exercises

Before you hit up that 30-day ab challenge to build abs, it’s important you understand what muscles you’re targeting. The abdomen has many muscles, but here are the five primary ones:

• Rectus Abdominis — Popularly known as the six-pack, the rectus abdominis creates the top layer of the abdominal muscles. Its functions include flexing (bending) the spine and moving the space between the ribcage and pelvis. 
• Transversus Abdominis — The transversus abdominis is the deepest of the abdominal muscles. It is a broad muscle needed for trunk stabilization, maintaining internal abdominal pressure, and supporting organs. 
• Pyramidalis — The pyramidalis is considered a science mystery because of its abnormalities and functions. It is a small, triangular abdominal muscle located at the pubic bone in front of the rectus abdominis. 
• Internal Obliques — The internal obliques are found underneath the external obliques on the sides of the abdomen. They support trunk movement and compression in the abdomen for stability. 
• External Obliques — The external obliques are the largest and most superficial of the flat abdominal wall muscles. They support movement in the spine and back.

Rest Up

If you wish to build abs, you need to prioritize rest. In any lifter’s workout program, rest days are purposefully inserted to allow their muscles time to recover. Without recovery time, the muscles don’t have the appropriate time to recuperate and grow stronger. 

You may be eager to achieve your fitness goal of showing off chiseled abs and a defined physique. To achieve this goal, you must prioritize proper rest to enhance progress in and out of the gym. This also reduces injury risk, as weakened muscles are more likely to tear or strain. 

Aim to give your abdominal muscles at least 24 hours of recovery between workout sessions. For heavier weight loads, muscles typically need around 48 hours of recovery time. Assign specific days for your core workouts and rest days in between to make staying on track easier. 

Emphasize Good Form & Technique

With any form of exercise, quality technique and correct form should be prioritized. There are a multitude of reasons for this, and the most common is to properly engage the targeted muscle groups. Other reasons for avoiding poor technique and form include reducing injury risk, straining muscles and joints, and muscular imbalances. 

Lifters can benefit from implementing strategies like breathing techniques to improve muscle engagement and reduce injury risk. In the concentric (lifting) portion of the exercise’s movement, exhale to tense the abdominal muscles and protect the spine. On the eccentric (lowering) portion of the movement, inhale to feed oxygen to the muscles. 

Top Exercises To Consider 

For your fitness journey to building abs, it’s important to program effective abdominal exercises. These exercises will help improve core strength, build muscle, and increase trunk stability by targeting various abdomen muscles. Here are some quality abdominal exercises to use:

• Plank — The plank is a bodyweight exercise with numerous modifications to reduce or increase intensity. It specifically targets the upper and lower rectus abdominis and other secondary muscles, such as the gluteus and erector spinae. 
• Dead Bug — The dead bug is appropriately named for its effective movement pattern, which promotes core stability and motor control. It primarily engages the lower rectus abdominis and secondary muscle groups like the upper rectus abdominis and the glutes. 
• Crunch — The crunch is a well-known ab exercise that can be performed anywhere. It has many variations, like the bicycle crunch, that can strengthen the core. 
• Bosu Bird Dog — One of the effective bosu ball ab exercises, the bosu bird dog targets the obliques and glutes. It is productive for improving core stability and strength. 

Conclusion

Before starting your ab workouts at home, it’s crucial to understand the factors determining your success in building abs. Genetics and body fat composition can vastly determine how quickly you can build abs for a defined physique. Understanding how your body works and what factors deter building abs can make or break your success. 

Frequently Asked Questions