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The barbell back squat is arguably the single most important movement in any strength and conditioning program. That is, if your strength and conditioning programming does not include the barbell back squat in some capacity, you should reconsider your programming. While you can certainly build up your leg muscles and strength by doing leg presses, leg extensions, leg curls, and other squat variations, like the front squat or split squat, you will not confer all of the total-body benefits that come with back squatting through doing these exercises.

Unlike these other leg exercises, the barbell back squat enables you to develop every major muscle group in your body. While I can't attest to this myself, Mark Rippetoe — arguably the best strength coach who ever lived — has gone on record saying that some of his own trainees have developed bodybuilder-level physiques from getting super strong on the back squat alone. When you squat with proper form, you’re working more than your legs — it becomes a total body exercise.

In light of the importance of the barbell back squat, whether or not to use knee sleeves arises. When most people think of using knee sleeves, their reasoning is to protect themselves from potential knee injuries. Likewise, many believe that using knee sleeves during the barbell back squat will confer performance benefits, such as the capacity to push heavier weights more safely.

But what do knee sleeves really do? Are they necessary for the barbell back squat? If you’re conflicted about using knee sleeves or not when barbell back squatting, you’ve landed on the right article.

Knee Sleeves versus Knee Wraps: Don’t Use Knee Wraps

Knee sleeves and knee wraps are similar tools for squatting. The idea behind both is to keep your knees compressed while squatting to protect your knees from potential injuries, keep them warm and comfortable during your set, and improve your performance on the barbell back squat by allowing you to push more weight.

Knee sleeves and knee wraps, however, differ considerably. And as you’ll see by the end of this article, the cons of knee wraps outweigh the pros, whereas there are nearly no cons to using knee sleeves and only pros.

Knee Wraps

Knee wraps are long and stretchy strips of elastic material. To use them, you must wrap them really tightly around your knee — on the actual knee cap, and slightly above it on your quadriceps and hamstring tendons, and slightly below it around your tibia. Given just how tightly you’re supposed to cover your knees with knee wraps — which is loose enough to have the flexibility to break 90 degrees at the bottom of your squat, but no looser than that — the whole notion of comfort goes out of the window when using them. Hence, one potential and supposed pro of knee wraps — that they will make you feel more comfortable while squatting — is a non-started and more or less a myth of gym lore.

On the other hand, research shows that using knee wraps can increase the weight you can push while barbell back squatting. However, there is an important caveat to this, which profoundly questions the utility of using knee wraps. Knee wraps can indeed improve your back squat strength, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that your leg muscles will keep up with such improvements in strength. Knee wraps actually reduce the amount of force produced by your leg muscles during the barbell back squat. Meaning that while your strength on the barbell back squat will improve with using knee wraps, it may also impair muscle growth in your legs.

Now, we can take these observations and extrapolate them over to a relevant example. Steroid users — specifically those who compete in bodybuilding at a high-level — do not use heavy weight very often. This is not because they can’t pick up heavyweight and use it efficiently in their training. Rather, it is because when you go on steroids, your muscle and strength development accelerate at a rate that is not on par with the development of your bone density. Meaning that your muscles are primed for super-heavy weights, but your bones might not be. Indeed, one of the unique benefits of being a natural lifter or athlete is that the rate of your muscle strength and growth is on par with the rate of your increases in bone density, which reduces the likelihood of serious injuries.

Bringing the problem back to knee wraps, while your strength levels will go up by using them, your rates of muscle growth may not. And when we consider by inference that many who use knee wraps do so because they are attempting to compensate for an already existing injury or site of pain, it is no wonder that researchers suggest that “knee wraps should not be worn during the strength and condition process, and perceived weakness in the knee joint should be assessed and treated.” Moreover, this recommendation ought not only to be laid at the feet of those simply looking to compensate for pre-existing injuries or pain but also those who are simply looking to get a leg-up — no pun intended — in their barbell back squat training and progress. To quote the same researchers, “The elastic properties of knee wraps increased mechanical output but altered back squat technique in a way that is likely to alter the musculature targeted by the exercise and possibly compromise the integrity of the knee joint.”

In short, don’t use knee wraps; their drawbacks are not worth the potential benefits. At this point, most researchers flat out say that knee wraps should not be worn during strength and conditioning training. We ought to heed their advice, especially when there is an alternative to knee wraps that have none of its drawbacks.

Knee sleeves

Knee sleeves are a total 180 from knee wraps. That is to say, knee sleeves come with almost no cons and all pros. As a result, there aren’t any drawbacks to be found in the use of knee sleeves, where there’s an abundance of shortcomings in the use of knee wraps.

Knee sleeves are tight-fitting neoprene or thick-polyester sleeves which your wear around your knees. There is no indication in the research that knee sleeves decrease leg muscle force during barbell back squats, nor is there any indication that using knee sleeves can increase the likelihood of injury. Finally, in stark contrast to using knee wraps, knee sleeves improve the comfort of your knees and legs during heavy barbell back squatting. They can even improve your form and stability on the movement, tangibly preventing the development of injuries and weaknesses at the knee joint. Its ability to confer these benefits rests on the consistency of compression which knee sleeves provide, which is neither too much nor too little — . In contrast, knee wraps, by necessity, provide too much compression.

There are even more benefits to using knee sleeves. For example, knee sleeves have been shown to measurably improve barbell back squat 1-rep-maxes (which is the maximum amount of weight a lifter can lift for only 1 rep on a given exercise). Knee sleeves can also improve your quadricep and hamstring performance and development by increasing the temperature of the muscles and joints surrounding the knee capsule and improving overall muscle coordination — again, aiding in the facilitation of proper barbell back squat technique.

Knee sleeves can provide a great advantage to your performance on the barbell back squat. By increasing joint and muscle warmth and facilitating proper technique, knee sleeves are a great option for those looking for an extra edge and piece of protection when performing a barbell back squat. However, do not misconstrue the utility of knee sleeves as some sort of crutch during an injury. Using knee sleeves will not improve the state of your injury — in fact, if you have pain or an injury, and you attempt to use knee sleeves to compensate, you will likely exacerbate your injury or pain. Hence, knee sleeves need only be used as a performance enhancer, only in cases where you have already gotten your squat technique down and when you are not in pain or injured.