Seated Leg Raises: Abs, Hip Flexors, and How To Do

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You have probably done seated leg raises hoping to carve out your abs. Odds are you mostly trained your hip flexors instead.

Seated leg raises are simple: sit down, keep your legs straight, and lift them, whether on the floor, a bench, or a chair.

Whether they build your core or just grind your hips comes down to a couple of details most people skip.

Below is what they actually work, how to do them so you feel your abs, plus the variations, mistakes, and programming that make the difference.

Key Takeaways

Seated leg raises train both your hip flexors and your abs, but the hip flexors do most of the work in the first half of every rep.
Your abs only take over past about 45 degrees of hip flexion, and only if you curl your pelvis under at the top.
They bias the lower abs more than crunches do, though total ab activation is lower than a hard crunch.
Three versions share the name: the floor pike, the bench recline, and the chair single-leg. The chair version is a rehab move, not an ab builder.
If you only ever feel your hips, you are staying too upright and skipping the pelvic tilt.

What Are Seated Leg Raises? The Three Versions Explained

Search “seated leg raise” and you will find three totally different exercises wearing the same name. That is why one person swears it is an ab crusher and another calls it a gentle rehab drill.

The Floor Pike (Calisthenics and Abs)

Sit on the floor with your legs straight out in front, hands beside or just behind your hips. Brace your core, lift your straight legs as high as control allows, then lower them slowly. This is the calisthenics version and the building block for an L-sit.

The Bench Recline (Gym Ab Builder)

Sit on the edge of a bench, grip the sides, and recline your torso to roughly 45 degrees. Crunch your legs and torso toward each other, then extend back out.

Because the torso moves too, this form makes it easier to add real ab work, and you can load it with a dumbbell.

The Chair Single-Leg (Rehab and Seniors)

Sit tall in a chair, extend one leg, and lift it. It is gentle on the knees and useful for mobility, but it never reaches the hip angles that meaningfully load your abs. Treat it as a rehab tool, not a core builder.

We care about abs, hip flexors, and the L-sit, so the rest of this guide sticks to the floor and bench forms.

What Muscles Do Seated Leg Raises Work? (Abs, Hip Flexors, or Both)

Chart showing hip flexors work the first 45 degrees of a leg raise and the abs take over past 45 degrees

The internet loves to argue that leg raises are “just a hip-flexor exercise.” The more useful answer: they are both, at different points in the rep.

The Hip Flexors Do the Lifting

The prime mover is the iliopsoas, a unit made of the psoas major, psoas minor, and iliacus that runs from your lumbar spine and inner pelvis down to the top of your thigh bone. It is the strongest hip flexor you have, and it drives your legs up.

Electromyography (EMG), which measures how hard a muscle fires, backs this up. One study found that from 0 to 45 degrees of hip flexion, the rectus femoris (a quad that also flexes the hip) fired far harder than the rectus abdominis, your six-pack muscle. Early in the rep, your abs are barely involved.

The rectus femoris crosses two joints, both the hip and the knee. That is why a straight-leg raise pulls it in hard, while bending your knees takes it partly out of play.

The Abs Take Over at the Top

The rectus abdominis has one main job here: stop your lower back from arching and flex your spine.

That means it fires much harder in the back half of the rep, past roughly 45 degrees. It fires harder still when you curl your pelvis under at the top.

They Hit the Lower Abs Harder Than Crunches

Ultrasound imaging found that leg raises produced the biggest thickness change in the lowest segment of the rectus abdominis, while crunches hit the top segment most

So leg raises genuinely favor the lower abs, which is why they pair well with another lower-ab move like pulse-ups.

Be honest with yourself, though. Total ab activation is still lower than a hard crunch. The lower-ab bias and the hip-flexor strength are the real payoff, not raw ab burn.

Benefits of Seated Leg Raises

Done right, seated leg raises give you a few things most ab moves skip.

Lower-ab strength and control: They train the bottom of your abs and the compression that keeps your midsection tight, exactly the region a standard crunch tends to skip. That deep-core control also helps you brace harder on bigger lifts.
Stronger hip flexors: Strong hip flexors help you sprint, kick, and drive your knees up, and they are the first thing to weaken if you sit all day. Training them through a full range beats endlessly stretching tight hip flexors, and it can even help your glutes fire better.
A direct path to the L-sit: The seated pike leg raise is a staple compression drill for calisthenics skills like the L-sit and toes-to-bar. If those are on your list, this move gets you there.
Almost no equipment: The floor or a bench is all you need, so they slot into any session.

How to Do Seated Leg Raises

The setup takes seconds. One cue, curling your pelvis at the top, is the difference between an ab exercise and a hip-flexor grind.

Floor Pike Version

Sit tall with your legs straight out, or lean back slightly on your hands placed just behind your hips.
Point your toes and brace your core as if you were about to take a light punch.
Lift your straight legs as high as your control allows, keeping them straight.
At the top, curl your pelvis under, rounding your lower back toward the floor, to fire your abs.
Lower slowly. Do not let your feet drop or slam down.

Bench Version

Sit on the edge of a bench and grip the sides for support.
Recline your torso back to about 45 degrees, with your legs hanging off the end.
Crunch your legs and torso toward each other at the same time.
Extend your legs back out for more challenge, keeping your midsection tight.
Lower under control, stopping before your lower back arches.

Shared cues: move slowly, own the lowering phase, and breathe out as you lift. The floor version asks for real hamstring flexibility, so if tight hamstrings make it brutal, start with bent knees or one leg at a time. That builds the full range of motion (ROM) that actually loads your abs.

Seated Leg Raise Variations and a Progression Ladder

You do not jump straight to an L-sit. You climb it, rung by rung.

Level	Variation	Why or when to progress
1	Bent-knee floor raise	Learn to curl the pelvis with less hamstring demand. Move up once you can do 3 sets of 12 to 15 clean reps.
2	Chair single-leg raise	A gentle assisted regression when the floor is too much. Build control and confidence first.
3	Floor straight-leg pike raise	The main move. Progress here once your hamstrings let you sit tall with straight legs.
4	Bench reclined leg raise	Adds a torso crunch and can be loaded. Progress once floor reps feel easy.
5	Weighted (dumbbell between ankles or ankle weights)	Add load only after your form is dialed in.
6	Seated pike hold, hands forward	Slide your hands toward your feet and hold. This builds the L-sit compression.
7	Tuck L-sit to full L-sit or hanging leg raise	The end goal. Full compression and hip-flexor strength together.

Beginners belong on the bent-knee floor raise, where you learn the pelvic tilt without fighting tight hamstrings. It works like an in and out abs move, just slower.

The floor straight-leg pike is the real gate. If you cannot sit tall with straight legs, your hamstrings are the limit, not your abs, so drill there.

From the seated pike, add hands-forward reps and top holds before you touch weight. That work carries into the L-sit and toes-to-bar. Our GHD sit-up alternatives round out a solid ab day.

Common Seated Leg Raise Mistakes to Avoid

If you have done a thousand leg raises and gotten nothing but tight hips and a sore back, one of these is the reason.

Staying rigid with no pelvic tilt: Keep your torso upright and just lift your legs, and your abs barely flex, so the rep stays all hip flexor. In one study, adding 30 degrees of trunk flexion to a straight-leg raise more than doubled rectus abdominis activation, to 40.4% from 17.8%, so the real fix is to curl your pelvis and crunch at the top.
Letting your lower back arch: An arched lower back causes pain and kills ab tension. Fix: press your lower back down into the floor or pad on every rep.
Using momentum: Swinging your legs up robs the abs of tension. Fix: slow down and control the lowering phase.
Over-bending the knees to cheat the range: Bent knees shorten the lever and make it easier, but they let you skip the hard part. Fix: keep your legs as straight as your flexibility allows.
Adding weight too soon: Loading before your form is solid just piles more onto already-busy hip flexors. Fix: earn the weight with clean bodyweight reps first.

How to Program Seated Leg Raises

How you program these depends on one thing: are you chasing a stronger six-pack or an L-sit?

For core strength and endurance: 2 to 3 sets of 12 to 25 reps at a controlled tempo. Abs respond well to higher reps, so do not be shy with volume.
For L-sit or skill work: 5 to 10 slow reps, or timed holds of 10 to 30 seconds at the top, with all your focus on compression.
Placement: Train these early in the session when you are fresh if your abs are a weak point. Bury them dead last and they will not grow. Otherwise, use them as a core finisher.
Frequency: 2 to 3 times a week is plenty. Progress in this order: add reps or hold time first, then move your hands forward, then add weight. Only reach for a dumbbell once you can hit around 25 clean reps through a full range.

Treat your abs like any muscle you actually want to build, with real effort and a full range on every set.

FAQs

What are seated leg raises good for?

They build lower-ab and hip-flexor strength, core control, and the compression you need to work toward an L-sit. They are less about raw ab size than a crunch, and more about training the bottom of your abs and your hip flexors together.

Do seated leg raises work your abs or hip flexors?

Both, at different points in the rep. Your hip flexors do the lifting, especially in the first half of the movement. Your abs take over past about 45 degrees, but only if you curl your pelvis under and crunch at the top.

Why do I only feel seated leg raises in my hip flexors?

You are almost certainly staying too upright and skipping the pelvic tilt. Let your hips open fully at the bottom, then curl your pelvis under and round your lower back at the top of each rep to shift the work onto your abs.

Are seated leg raises good for lower abs?

Yes. They bias the lower part of your rectus abdominis more than crunches do, which hit the upper region. Just keep in mind that total ab activation is lower than a hard crunch, so use them alongside other core work.

Can beginners do seated leg raises?

Yes, with the right starting point. Begin with the bent-knee floor version or a chair single-leg raise, then progress to straight legs as your abs get stronger and your hamstrings loosen up. Rushing to straight legs is the usual mistake.

Bottom Line

Seated leg raises are a hip-flexor and lower-ab exercise, and which one you actually train comes down to a single choice: do you curl your pelvis at the top, or not?

They will not out-crunch a crunch for raw ab activation. But they build lower-ab and hip-flexor strength that a crunch misses, and they open the door to the L-sit.

Start here. Sit on the floor, bend your knees, and do one set focused only on curling your pelvis under so you feel your abs, not your hips.

Once that clicks, straighten your legs and climb the ladder. Add weight last, never first.