Cable Wrist Curl

How to do the Cable Wrist Curl

1. 1Attach a straight bar to a low pulley cable machine.
2. 2Stand facing the machine with your feet shoulder-width apart.
3. 3Grasp the bar with an underhand grip, palms facing up, and your hands shoulder-width apart.
4. 4Rest your forearms on a bench or pad, with your wrists hanging off the edge.
5. 5Keeping your forearms stationary, exhale and curl your wrists upward as far as possible.
6. 6Pause for a moment at the top, then inhale and slowly lower the bar back to the starting position.
7. 7Repeat for the desired number of repetitions.

Tip: Use higher reps, 15 to 25, and lower the weight through a full three-second descent.

Muscles worked

Common mistakes

• Using the whole arm — the forearms should rest on a bench or your thighs with only the hands moving; if the elbows lift, you are cheating.
• Gripping hard on the descent — let the bar roll down to the fingertips at the bottom of a wrist curl for the full range before curling back up.
• Reverse curls too heavy — the wrist extensors are small, so use about half of what you use for regular wrist curls.
• Fast, short reps — go slowly through the full range and feel the stretch at the bottom, since jerky reps with a heavy weight are how wrists get irritated.

Where it fits in a workout

Wrist curls go last in a session after all the pulling and gripping work is done. Superset regular and reverse wrist curls back to back.

How many sets, how heavy and how hard: see what the ACSM position stands support.

Variations and alternatives

When to talk to someone

• Chest discomfort, feeling faint or lightheaded, or trouble breathing during or after exercise can be signs of a heart attack. In the US, call 911 right away; elsewhere, call your local emergency number.
• Heart, metabolic or kidney disease, or symptoms like these when you are active: talk to your doctor before you start or step up training.
• Pregnant: ask your obstetric care provider which exercise suits you.

More exercises

• All arms exercises
• All forearms exercises
• All cable exercises
• Banded Reverse Wrist Curl
• Resistance Band Wrist Curl
• Behind the Back Barbell Wrist Curl
• Bench Barbell Wrist Curl
• Dumbbell Reverse Wrist Curl
• Bench Dumbbell Reverse Wrist Curl

Sources

1. ACSM position stand on exercise quantity and quality (Garber et al., 2011)
2. ACSM preparticipation health screening (Riebe et al., 2015)
3. ACOG Committee Opinion No. 804 on exercise in pregnancy (2020)
4. CDC: About Heart Attack Symptoms, Risk, and Recovery (2024)

Sources checked on October 17, 2026. Full citations are in the exercise library.