A burpee is a full-body exercise combining a squat, push-up, and jump into a single, exhausting movement. It begins standing, drops into a squat with hands on the ground, kicks back into a plank position, performs a push-up, returns to squat, and jumps explosively upward with arms overhead. Then repeat. Many times.
The exercise was invented by Royal H. Burpee, an American physiologist, in the 1930s as a fitness test for the YMCA. His original version was gentler — no push-up, no jump — but military trainers and CrossFit culture have made the burpee increasingly brutal. It is now considered one of the most efficient calorie-burning exercises in existence, and also one of the most hated.
Why It Matters
The burpee is the exercise everyone loves to hate. It requires no equipment, works every major muscle group, and elevates heart rate faster than almost any other bodyweight movement. Military fitness tests, CrossFit workouts (“Burpees over the bar”), and HIIT programs all use burpees as a benchmark of total-body conditioning.
The exercise also has a psychological dimension. Burpees are designed to be uncomfortable. The mental challenge of continuing when every fiber of your body wants to stop is part of their training value. “Drop and give me 20 burpees” is a modern punishment that rivals the classic push-up.
Examples
- CrossFit: Burpees appear in workouts like “Open Workout 12.1” and “Murph.”
- Military training: Used as a punishment and conditioning exercise.
- Royal H. Burpee: The physiologist who never intended his test to become torture.
Related Terms
- HIIT, bodyweight exercise, calisthenics
- Push-up, squat, jump
- CrossFit, conditioning, fitness test