Kettlebell Press: How to Do the Kettlebell Overhead Press Properly

The kettlebell overhead press is a strict, one-arm press from the rack position at your chest to a locked-out arm above your head. Clean the bell to your shoulder, brace your whole body, and drive it straight up with your bicep finishing by your ear. It looks like a dumbbell shoulder press, but the bell sits behind your hand, which changes the groove and makes your trunk and shoulder stabilisers work harder for every kilo. Here's how to set up, what to think about on each rep, and how to pick the right bell.

Get the bell into the rack first

Every good press starts from a good rack, and the rack starts with a kettlebell clean. Don't curl the bell up or swing it wildly to your shoulder. Clean it so it rolls around your hand and lands softly on your forearm.

In the rack:

• The handle runs diagonally across your palm, sitting low near the thumb.
• Your wrist is straight, knuckles pointing up, and the bell rests on the back of your forearm.
• Your elbow is tucked in close to your ribs, with your fist roughly in front of your collarbone.
• You can breathe. If the rack feels like a fight, the bell is in the wrong place.

How to do a kettlebell press

1. Set your feet. Stand with your feet about hip-width apart, weight spread across the whole foot.
2. Brace. Breathe into your belly, then squeeze your glutes and tighten your abs as if someone's about to punch you. Your legs and trunk make the platform you press from.
3. Pull your lat down. Before the bell moves, think about pulling your shoulder down into its socket and squeezing your armpit. A tight lat gives the press a stable base and keeps your shoulder from shrugging up.
4. Press up and slightly out. Drive the bell straight up. Your forearm stays vertical under the bell the whole way, and the elbow travels slightly out to the side as it rises.
5. Finish by your ear. Lock the elbow with your bicep close to your ear and the bell stacked over your shoulder, hip and mid-foot. Your wrist is still straight; don't let the bell flop backwards.
6. Pull it back down. Lower under control, almost as if you're rowing the bell back to the rack with your lat. Reset your breath and brace before the next rep.

Why a kettlebell press feels different from a dumbbell

With a dumbbell, the weight sits in your hand, level with your grip. A kettlebell's centre of mass hangs behind your wrist, resting on your forearm. That offset load pulls your wrist backwards and tries to drag the bell out of the groove, so your forearm, rotator cuff and shoulder blade muscles have to keep it stacked.

The research is small, but it points the same way. In one study of 21 people pressing the same load, the dumbbell produced slightly higher front deltoid activity than the kettlebell, which the authors linked to the dumbbell being the more stable implement (Dicus et al., 2018). A 2024 study of 28 college baseball players pressing 11.34kg found the bottoms-up grip raised serratus anterior activity compared with both a normal kettlebell grip and a dumbbell, while the dumbbell worked the side deltoid and lower trapezius harder (Busch et al., 2024).

So the practical takeaway: dumbbells are a touch better for loading the delts heavy, kettlebells for training the shoulder to stay stable. Plenty of people also find the kettlebell rack kinder on cranky shoulders, because the bell sits close to the body instead of out beside the head.

Muscles worked

• Deltoids. The front and side delts are the main movers, lifting your arm overhead.
• Triceps. They take over in the top half of the press to lock the elbow.
• Serratus anterior and trapezius. These rotate the shoulder blade upward so your arm can reach full lockout without pinching.
• Rotator cuff. Keeps the ball of the shoulder centred while the offset bell tries to pull it around.
• Lats, obliques and glutes. One bell on one side means your trunk has to resist bending sideways and arching backwards. That's why a heavy single-arm press is harder on your core than it looks.

Common mistakes

Leaning back or sideways. If you have to bend away from the bell to finish, it's too heavy, or your glutes and abs have switched off. Squeeze both and drop a size if you have to.

A bent wrist. Letting the bell pull your hand back puts load on the wrist joint and leaks force. Grip the handle low near the thumb and punch your knuckles at the ceiling.

Shrugging. Hiking your shoulder up to your ear at the start makes the press weaker and often uncomfortable. Pull the lat down before you press.

Pressing out in front. If the bell drifts forward of your face, you're pressing on a lever arm. Keep the forearm vertical and finish with the bell over your mid-foot, not over your toes.

Dropping the bell to the rack. Letting it crash back down wastes the eccentric and batters your forearm. Pull it down under control.

Variations

• Single-arm strict press. The standard version and the one to master first. Feet planted, no leg drive.
• Half-kneeling press. Kneel on the same side as the pressing arm, other foot forward. Taking your legs out of it makes leaning back obvious and forces your glutes and abs to stay on. A great fix for lifters who arch.
• Bottoms-up press. Flip the bell upside down, holding the handle with the base pointing at the ceiling. You'll need a much lighter bell (often half your normal press weight or less), a crushing grip and slow, precise reps. It's brilliant for shoulder stability and grip, and it'll tell you straight away if your wrist and forearm aren't stacked.
• Double kettlebell press. Two bells, two arms, pressed together. You lose the anti-lean core demand, but you can move more total weight, which makes it a good strength builder once you own the single-arm version. It needs a matched pair of bells.
• Push press. Dip a few centimetres at the knees, then drive up hard with your legs and finish the press with your arm. It lets you handle heavier bells than you can press strictly, and the slow lowering builds strength for your strict press.

What weight to start with

Most women start strict pressing with a 6kg or 8kg bell and most men with 12kg or 16kg, though your history matters more than your sex. Pick the bell you can press for 5 clean reps per side with a straight wrist and no lean. Our full guide to what weight kettlebell to use breaks it down by exercise.

The awkward part is that the press is usually your lightest kettlebell lift by a distance. You'll swing a bell you can't come close to pressing, and the jump from one fixed bell to the next (often 4kg) is a big percentage change for a small muscle group. That's where an adjustable kettlebell earns its place, since it lets you climb in smaller steps. The Bells of Steel adjustable kettlebell is one option we've looked at, and our roundup of the best kettlebells in the UK covers fixed cast iron bells and sets if you'd rather buy individual sizes.

Sets and reps

• Strength: 3 to 5 sets of 3 to 6 reps per arm, resting 90 seconds to 2 minutes.
• Muscle and endurance: 3 sets of 8 to 12 per arm with a lighter bell.
• Ladders: Press 1 rep, then 2, then 3, swapping arms each step. Run 3 to 5 ladders. It's an easy way to rack up quality reps without grinding.

Press two or three times a week. When you can hit the top of your rep range on every set without leaning, move up a bell or a few kilos.

Recommended reads

1. Kettlebell clean: how to do it without bruising your forearm
2. What weight kettlebell should I use?
3. Adjustable kettlebell: is one worth buying?
4. The best kettlebells in the UK
5. Bells of Steel adjustable kettlebell review