How do you jump higher? The exercises that improve your performance

Jumping higher means getting your centre of mass as high as possible vertically, using nothing but your muscles. It isn't a fixed gift: it depends on four trainable factors, and below you'll find what they are and which exercises work on them.

Vertical jump matters in almost every sport: to the volleyball player who has to block, the basketball player driving to the rim, the footballer who has to head one in from the box.

What really affects your vertical

1. Maximal leg strength. It's the base: without strength there's no power to express, however fast you are.
2. Rate of force development. It isn't only how much force you produce, but how quickly you can produce it. In a jump you have fractions of a second.
3. Muscular coordination. The ability of your muscles to work together instead of fighting each other.
4. The stretch-shortening cycle. How much elastic energy you can store in the loading phase and give back in the drive.

Those are four different things, and it explains why two athletes with the same squat strength can jump very differently: one has learned to use it fast, the other hasn't.

Before you train: take your starting number

Before starting any program, measure your jump. With the JHP test you upload a two-second video and get the height in centimeters, calculated from flight time. It's free, no app needed, and the video never leaves your phone.

Without that number, two months from now you won't be able to say whether the work paid off or whether it just feels like it.

➡️ Measure your jump, free

The two training methods for the jump

There are countless exercises, but they come down to two routes, and the important thing is that you need both.

The direct method

Purely plyometric training. It improves neuromuscular coordination, muscle-tendon flexibility, how much elastic energy your muscles hold, and motor unit activation.

The exercises have to be done fast and explosively: one- or two-leg jumps, hurdle jumps, drop jumps and box jumps, jumping lunges.

The transfer method

This trains maximal and explosive strength with exercises that aren't jumps — typically loaded work. The aim is to build the base strength that plyometrics then converts into speed of expression.

Doing only plyometrics without strength leads to a quick plateau. Doing only weights without plyometrics builds strength you can't express in 200 milliseconds. You need them together.

3 exercises to start from

1. Forward squat jumps — jump forward holding the squat position, distance increasing with your level. 3 sets of 4-5 jumps.
2. Box jumps — jump onto a step or box, height chosen for your level. Steady rhythm. 3 sets of 10 jumps.
3. Lunges — among the best for the lower body and the quads. More advanced athletes can hold a weight. 3 sets of 5 lunges per side.

One rule matters more than the exercises: explosive work is done fresh, at the start of the session, with full rests between sets. Put it at the end of a two-hour match and you're training endurance, not power.

There are no shortcuts

As in any discipline, there are no secret exercises that add centimeters overnight. Results come from consistency, method and load progression over time.

What you can do is stop working at random: follow a plan that alternates strength and plyometrics sensibly, and check every four weeks with the test whether the number is moving.

The JHP subscription has 13 programs with day-by-day plans, video for every exercise and WhatsApp support, at €99/year:

• Jump Higher Program — 10 weeks bodyweight, if you don't have a gym (€60)
• JHP Gym Edition — 16 weeks in the weight room, the "transfer" side of the work (€60)
• Jumping Monster — 14 days of intensive plyometrics, the "direct" side (€40)
• The French Contrast Method — the two methods alternated in the same session (€90)

You can also buy them individually. From two up, the subscription is the better deal.

You might also like: how to assess your jump progress and 3 bodyweight exercises to get started.