Women · six levels · every bodyweight
Average Bench Press for Women: Standards by Age & Weight
Among women who compete, the median woman benches about 127 lb58 kg. A bodyweight bench is Advanced. Here is the whole scale, on its own table, for the reason below.
Women · 140 lb64 kg bodyweight
- Beginner
- from the bar
- Novice
- from 7032
- Intermediate
- from 10548
- Advanced
- from 14064
- Elite
- from 21095
- World Class
- from 252114
Find your rank
Where does your bench sit?
Against women your size. One rep is a one-rep max; a set of up to twelve gets estimated.
1 rep counts as your one-rep max here; the app's own estimate scores a single about 3% higher. Enter a set of up to 12 reps and we estimate it (Epley).
Calculations run in your browser. We measure usage, including strength levels and broad bodyweight ranges.
Your bench
127lb
Intermediate
at or above 55% of women competing in the data at your bodyweight
A 0.91× bodyweight bench is Intermediate for a 140 lb64 kg woman. Advanced starts at 140 lb64 kg, 13 lb6 kg away.
Standards by bodyweight
Bench press standards for women
| Bodyweight | Beginner | Novice | Intermediate | Advanced | Elite | World Class |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| under 12155 | 45202% | 55252% | 833820% | 1105055% | 1657596% | 1989099% |
| 12155–14365reference bodyweight | 45201% | 66302% | 994520% | 1326060% | 1989097% | 238108100% |
| 14365–16575 | 45201% | 77353% | 1165330% | 1547070% | 23110598% | 278126100% |
| 16575–18785 | 45201% | 88405% | 1326040% | 1768080% | 26512099% | 317144100% |
| 18785–20995 | 45201% | 994510% | 1496860% | 1989090% | 298135100% | 357162100% |
| 20995–231105 | 45201% | 1105015% | 1657565% | 22010094% | 331150100% | 397180100% |
| 231105+ | 45201% | 1245622% | 1868477% | 24811296% | 372169100% | 446202100% |
Each cell is the floor of its level for a lifter in the middle of that bodyweight bracket; the app works from your exact bodyweight. A 140 lb64 kg woman who benches 140 lb64 kg is Advanced and stays Advanced until 210 lb95 kg. Beginner starts at the empty bar; for many women the bar itself is the first milestone, and a real one.
Distribution
How rare is a good bench for a woman?
Every tested one-rep max in the data, women, all bodyweights. 30% have benched their bodyweight; 43% have benched a plate a side.
Milestones
The plates, for women
What each rung means for a 140 lb64 kg woman, and how many women in the data have reached it.
- 13561Intermediate43% of women have lifted it · 1 in 2
- 18584Advanced10% of women have lifted it · 1 in 10
- 225102Elite2% of women have lifted it · 1 in 41
- 275125World Class<1% of women have lifted it · 1 in 244
- 315143World Class<1% of women have lifted it · under 1 in 1,000
- 405184World Class0% of women have lifted it · under 1 in 1,000
By age
Average bench press for girls and women by age
Girls 13 to 18, each with a page of the same six floors by bodyweight and the competitor percentile for that age.
boys, median competitor girls, median competitorage · lbkg · among lifters of that age who compete in our data
Why a separate table
Why women's bench standards are their own scale
Of the three powerlifts, the bench shows the largest gap between men and women, because it depends most on upper-body muscle mass and least on the hips and legs. At the same bodyweight, the women's Intermediate line sits at the men's Novice line and the women's Elite between the men's Intermediate and Advanced. Scoring a woman's bench against the men's table would call most women a Beginner or Novice, which is both wrong and useless. So the women's standards are their own table: Stronger's scale has its own multiples of bodyweight for women, and the app scores a woman's lifts on them.
What a strong bench looks like. For a 140 lb64 kg woman: Novice from 70 lb32 kg, Intermediate from 105 lb48 kg, Advanced from 140 lb64 kg, Elite from 210 lb95 kg. A bodyweight bench is Advanced. Two plates a side, 225 lb, has been benched by 2% of women who compete in our data.
Where to start. The empty bar, then five-pound jumps, with the shoulder blades pinned and the feet planted. Most women stall not for lack of chest strength but for lack of triceps and shoulder work: close-grip pressing, dips and overhead pressing fix more benches than more benching does.
How we calculate
Where these numbers come from
Percentiles are built from 1,668,369 bench press competition results (one per lifter per meet) by 556,880 lifters, updated September 2026. We show the method so you can judge it.
The distribution. Our percentiles come from competition results in the OpenPowerlifting open dataset: each lifter's best successful raw bench, with sex, bodyweight and age recorded at the meet. These numbers describe competitive powerlifters, people who entered a sanctioned meet and trained for it. They are stronger than the general gym population, and far stronger than the general public. We say so wherever a percentile appears. Drug-tested divisions bench less at the median than untested ones (men: 276 lb vs 305 lb); the headline numbers pool both.
The levels. Six bands, the same six Stronger uses to score every lift in the app, and read the same way. The app divides your best estimated one-rep max by your bodyweight and compares it with a set of multipliers for each lift, so each cutoff is the floor of its band for that bodyweight, and crossing it puts you in. World Class starts at 1.2 times the Elite floor. We do not redraw the scale from the competition data; we put the competition percentile beside every floor so you can see how rare each level is among people who compete.
Testing a one-rep max. Warm up to it in jumps that get smaller as the bar gets heavier, take three to five minutes between the last attempts, and use a spotter or safeties. If you would rather not max out, take a set of two to six clean reps and let the calculator estimate it; the Epley formula we use is accurate to within a few percent under ten reps.
- Beginner
- The lowest band on Stronger’s scale, from the empty bar up to the Novice floor.
- Novice
- The second band on Stronger’s scale, from the Novice floor up to the Intermediate floor.
- Intermediate
- The third band on Stronger’s scale, from the Intermediate floor up to the Advanced floor.
- Advanced
- The fourth band on Stronger’s scale, from the Advanced floor up to the Elite floor.
- Elite
- The second-highest band on Stronger’s scale. Competition rankings are shown separately.
- World Class
- The highest band on Stronger’s scale, not a claim of a federation record or qualification.
Sources
- OpenPowerlifting open datasetOpenPowerlifting project2026-09-05CC0Percentile curves, milestone shares, age curves and population counts: 556,880 raw lifters (best successful competition bench each), sanctioned meets only, para and equipped divisions excluded.
- Stronger's Strength Score scale for the bench pressStrongerThe app's six levels per sex, as multiples of bodyweight. Each table floor is worked out for the middle of its bodyweight bracket, and the app scores a single rep about 3% above the weight lifted, so near a floor the app's level can differ from the table's.
All 18 cited sources
- Association of Strength Performance in Bench Press and Squat with Anthropometric Variables between Resistance-Trained Males and FemalesJournal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology / MDPI (original article in PMC)2023-02-01Bench press and squat strength of trained women and men.
- Gender differences in strength and muscle fiber characteristicsEuropean Journal of Applied Physiology and Occupational Physiology / Springer1993-03Upper- and lower-body strength of women and men.
- Bench Press Standards for Men and Women (lb)Strength Level LimitedPublished standards table: By Bodyweight
- Bench Press Standards for Men and Women (kg)Strength LevelStrength Level published standards
- Bench Press Strength Standards for Men and Women (kg)StrengthLogPublished standards table: Bench Press Strength Standards by Body Weight
- Bench Press Strength Standards for Men and Women (lb)StrengthLogStrengthLog / Styrkelabbet published standards
- 2023 STRENGTH STANDARDS — Snatch – Clean & Jerk – Back Squat – Bench Press – Deadlift – PressLon Kilgore / Kilgore Academy2023Published standards table: BENCH PRESS (MEN) / BENCH PRESS (WOMEN)
- Basic Strength StandardsThe Aasgaard Company2012Published standards table: Bench Press - Adult Men / Bench Press - Adult Women
- Bench Press StandardsExRx.netPublished standards table: Bench Press Standards
- Bench Press Strength StandardsGravitus, Inc.Published standards table: Bench Press Standards by Bodyweight (lb)
- Max Bench Press CalculatorGravitus, Inc.Women's standards table: Bench Press Standards for Women (lbs)
- Bench Press StandardsStrength OriginsPublished standards table: Competitive Bench Press Standards
- Profiling the absolute and relative strength of a special operations police unitBMC Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation / Springer Nature2022-06-20Published standards table: Table 2. Bodyweight, strength data and overall change (Mean ± SD) for five TPs over 18 months — Bench Press Absolute Strength (kg)
- Bench Press TestBrianMac Sports CoachPublished standards table: A good 1RM for the bench press
- 1RM Bench Press Calculator - Test Your Upper Body StrengthTopend Sports / Robert WoodPublished standards table: 1 Rep Max Bench Press Table for adults (weight lifted per bodyweight)
- How Much Can the Average Person Bench Press?Healthline2019-06-14Published standards table: Bench press average by weight — Men / Women
- Lifter Classifications100% RAW Powerlifting Federation2012-01-01Women's standards table: Women’s Bench Press
- Triage Ultimate Health Targets Assessment ToolTriageMethodWomen's standards table: Bench Press (1RM) – (Weight: 1.5)
How our scale compares
Our six levels are Stronger's own scale, and the percentages beside them come from competition results. Below is a summary of the published tables people actually copy: whose numbers they are, whom they describe and how they were made, so you can see how a “good” bench on this page compares to what other sources call good. None of them measures the general population either.
- Strength Level Limited · 18 tables (lb, ratio, kg)Male and female Strength Level usersOriginally based on fixed Kilgore/ExRx tables in 2007. Publisher says July 2015 replaced that model with community-data regressions; May 2016 incorporated joint lift/bodyweight modelling. Current table belongs to the 2026 refresh. These are not independent probability estimates for all adults.
- StrengthLog · 12 tables (kg, lb)Men and women who use StrengthLogStrengthLog says the standards are calculated from user training logs; no Kilgore derivation is claimed. Sample date, age distribution, lift-verification protocol and detailed statistical construction are not supplied on the inspected page.
- Lon Kilgore / Kilgore Academy · 1 table (kg)Men and women, ages 15–89Author combines scientific literature, published drug-tested classic/raw lifting results and coaching observation. The author resource page explicitly says the 2023 revision supersedes prior tables. No cell-level dataset or reproducible estimation code is provided.
- The Aasgaard Company · 2 tables (lb)Adult Men / Adult WomenSource specifies Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, 3rd edition techniques. Every bench numeric cell matches the inspected 2007 ExRx table, but level names differ. This is documented numerical identity, not proof of an unpublished licensing or authorship history.
- ExRx.net · 1 table (lb)Adult men and womenExplanatory source credits Dr. Lon Kilgore, the training definitions in Practical Programming (Kilgore, Rippetoe, Pendlay), Starting Strength exercise technique and published lifting-performance standards. Numeric identity with the publisher-hosted 2012 Starting Strength sheet is directly established.
- Gravitus, Inc. · 5 tables (lb)Male / Female Gravitus usersPublisher-owned app logs; best estimated 1RM per lifter, Brzycki formula, extreme outliers excluded. Asterisks designate weight points with fewer than 50 lifters, estimated by the publisher through allometric scaling.
- Strength Origins · 2 tables (lb)Men / Women; raw, drug-tested, sanctioned full-power competitors, ages 16–65Publisher, not this inventory, processed OpenPowerlifting using Power Query; best-total performance per lifter-year, valid nonzero full SBD results, raw and drug-tested, weight classes rebinned to IPF style. No underlying data were downloaded or recomputed for this job.
- BMC Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation / Springer Nature · 2 tables (kg, ratio)47 male Australian elite police officersPrimary retrospective cohort measurements; barbell touches chest, full extension, bench contact maintained. Same lead coach across tests.
- BrianMac Sports Coach · 1 table (ratio)men / womenAuthor-published coaching judgment; no cell-level dataset or derivation is given. A separate McArdle citation is used by the page’s assessment machinery, but the source does not prove these two good thresholds are that table.
- Topend Sports / Robert Wood · 1 table (ratio)adults; both sexes as stated by the publisherThe author explicitly attributes the scores to personal experience, not a federation, research sample or ACSM norm.
- Healthline · 1 table (lb)Men / Women, ages 18–59; page explains sex as assigned at birthThe page links ExRx for these standards. Unlike the fixed numerical 2007 ExRx/2012 Starting Strength cells, this page prints ranges. No inspected evidence establishes how those range endpoints were constructed.
- 100% RAW Powerlifting Federation · 1 table (lb)Women competing in 100% RAW; ranking-informed performance classes, not population normsFAQ identifies PowerliftingWatch rankings, primarily 2008–2010, as the backbone of Elite standards, with formulas, federation input and judgment. Other classes are related to Elite. The female FAQ explicitly discusses limited participation and hypothetical stronger fields. No uniform male×factor derivation is stated.
- TriageMethod · 1 table (ratio)Women using the publisher’s health-targets assessment; no sampled population disclosedPublisher explicitly sets female standards at approximately 60–75% of male standards, varying by movement. This is a stated coaching method; no fixed 0.6 factor is applied or inferred here.
What apps publish about their own users
- Strength Level: average bench of 212 lb among male Strength Level cohort; no fixed bodyweightMethod: Self-submitted lifts feed fitted strength/bodyweight distributions. Rep sets can be converted to estimated 1RM. Not a general-population figure.
- Strength Level: average bench of 112 lb among female Strength Level cohort; no fixed bodyweightMethod: Self-submitted lifts feed fitted strength/bodyweight distributions. Rep sets can be converted to estimated 1RM. Not a general-population figure.
- StrengthLog / Styrkelabbet: average bench of 100 kg among male users in the 24,408-user bench standards cohortMethod: Public standards cite users’ training logs, but do not fully disclose selection, deduplication or fitting. Not a general-population figure.
- StrengthLog / Styrkelabbet: average bench of 47 kg among female users in the 24,408-user bench standards cohortMethod: Public standards cite users’ training logs, but do not fully disclose selection, deduplication or fitting. Not a general-population figure.
Our own figure, for comparison: the median competitor in the data benches 281 lb127 kg (men) and 127 lb58 kg (women).
Questions people ask
Bench press for women, answered
How much can the average woman bench press?
Among women who compete in our data, the median woman benches about 127 lb58 kg for one rep, which is Intermediate for a 140 lb64 kg woman. The general-population figure is lower.
What is a good bench press for a woman?
For a 140 lb64 kg woman, Intermediate starts at 105 lb48 kg and Advanced at 140 lb64 kg. Among women who compete at around 140 lb64 kg in our data, 70% bench at least the Intermediate floor and 29% at least the Advanced floor.
Should a woman be able to bench her bodyweight?
A bodyweight bench is Advanced for a 140 lb64 kg woman in our standards, and 30% of women competing in our data have benched their own bodyweight. It is a serious milestone, not a baseline.
How many women can bench 135?
43% of women in our data have benched 135 lb, about 1 in 2. For a 140 lb64 kg woman it is Intermediate.
How does the average woman's bench compare to the average man's?
Among people who compete in our data, the median woman benches 127 lb58 kg and the median man 281 lb127 kg, so the median woman lifts about 45% of what the median man does. The gap is wider on the bench than on the squat or deadlift because it is an upper-body lift, and it is why women get their own table rather than the men's numbers discounted.
Why are women's bench press standards lower than men's?
Upper-body muscle mass, mostly. In a 2023 study of trained adults, women's bench one-rep max averaged 54.6 kg against 110.7 kg for men, a 51% gap, while the squat gap was 39%; a classic 1993 comparison put women's upper-body strength at about 52% of men's and lower-body strength at 66%. Strength per unit of muscle is much closer than those numbers suggest; women simply carry less of it above the waist. None of that changes what a level means: on Stronger's scale for women, each level starts at the same multiple of bodyweight at every size.
Sources: Association of Strength Performance in Bench Press and Squat with Anthropometric Variables between Resistance-Trained Males and Females (Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology, 2023) · Gender differences in strength and muscle fiber characteristics (European Journal of Applied Physiology and Occupational Physiology, 1993)
Do women's strength standards underestimate women?
A percentile only ever describes the women in the dataset behind it, and every dataset is self-selected: fewer women compete or log their lifts, and the ones who do are the keen end. Ours comes from women who entered a powerlifting meet, which is the strong end of the strong end, so if anything the percentiles on this page make a given number look more common than it is among women in general. The six levels are a separate thing: Stronger's scale, not a percentile, so a level means what it means whoever else logs.
How much should a woman bench in kg?
The same scale, in kilograms. For a 64 kg woman, Novice starts at 32 kg, Intermediate at 48 kg, Advanced at 64 kg and Elite at 95 kg. The lb/kg toggle at the top of the page switches every number, including the table.
Scored against women, every set, automatically.
Stronger uses the women's standards for women, adjusted for bodyweight, so the Strength Score means what it should. It shows a strength level for each muscle group on a colour-coded body map and keeps the log as the number climbs.
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