Treadmills collect dust. Rowing machines become coat racks. Pelotons turn into furniture. But a heavy bag? A heavy bag gets used. There’s a reason every boxing gym in the world is built around them — nothing else gives you the same combination of cardio, strength, stress relief, and full-body conditioning in one workout.
You don’t need a gym membership. You don’t need a trainer. You don’t need to know how to fight. You just need a bag, a pair of gloves, and the willingness to throw hands for a few rounds. Everything else comes with time.
Get Your Gear
You don’t need much. Here’s what to buy before your first session:
A heavy bag. For home use, a 70-pound bag works for most people. If you’re over 200 pounds, go with 100. Hanging bags are ideal if you have the ceiling support or a stand. Freestanding bags work if you’re in an apartment or don’t want to drill into anything. Either way, you’re covered.
Best Heavy Bags for Home Gyms: Complete Guide
Bag gloves. Don’t hit a heavy bag bare-fisted. You’ll hurt your wrists and tear up your knuckles. Bag gloves come in 10oz to 16oz. Heavier gloves give you more protection and a better workout because of the added weight. 12oz is a solid starting point for most people.
For your first pair, Everlast makes solid entry-level gloves that hold up for months without breaking the bank. If you want to invest in something that lasts and feels like a completely different experience on the bag, Cleto Reyes bag gloves are the gold standard. They’re pricey, but the leather, the fit, and the wrist support are on another level. Once you put on a pair of Reyes gloves you’ll understand why fighters swear by them.
Best Boxing Gloves for Beginners: Complete Buying Guide
Hand wraps (optional but recommended). If you’re going to be hitting the bag regularly, wraps protect your wrists and knuckles under the gloves. They take 30 seconds to put on once you learn how and they make a real difference in keeping your hands healthy long-term. If you’re just doing a casual workout once or twice a week, gloves alone are fine. If you’re getting serious, wrap up.
Best Hand Wraps for Boxing: How to Choose and Wrap
That’s it. Bag, gloves, wraps. You’re ready.
The Basics: How to Hit the Bag
You don’t need to be a boxer to use a heavy bag. But a few fundamentals will keep you from hurting yourself and help you get more out of every round.
Stance. Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart. If you’re right-handed, left foot forward. Left-handed, right foot forward. Keep your knees slightly bent. Stay on the balls of your feet.
Keep your hands up. Every time you’re not throwing a punch, your hands should be up by your face. This keeps your shoulders engaged — which means more calories burned — and builds the habit that separates a real workout from just swinging at a bag.
The jab. Your lead hand, straight out and straight back. Quick and sharp. The jab is the most important punch in boxing. It sets up everything else. Throw 10. Get comfortable. Feel the bag.
The cross. Your rear hand, straight down the middle with your hips rotating into it. This is your power shot. Jab then cross. That’s your first combination.
The hook. Bend your arm at 90 degrees and swing it in an arc, rotating your whole body into it. Hooks to the body, hooks up top. These are the punches that build core strength because your entire torso has to rotate to generate the power.
Breathe. Exhale sharply every time you throw a punch. If you’re holding your breath, you’ll gas out in 30 seconds. Short, sharp breaths out with every shot.
That’s all you need to know to start. Jab, cross, hook. Hands up. Breathe. Move your feet. You’ll get better every session.
Three Workouts for Any Level
Workout 1: The Beginner (Just Getting Started)
If you’ve never hit a bag before or you’re coming back after a long layoff, start here.
3 rounds / 2 minutes each / 1 minute rest between rounds
- Round 1: Jabs only. Focus on keeping your hands up between every punch. Find your range. Get a rhythm going.
- Round 2: Jab-cross combinations. Every time you throw the cross, rotate your hips into it. Feel the power difference between an arm punch and a full-body punch.
- Round 3: Free round. Jabs, crosses, hooks — whatever feels natural. Move your feet. Don’t stand in one spot. Circle the bag.
That’s 9 minutes of work. If you’re breathing heavy and your shoulders are burning, it’s working. Do this 3 times a week for the first two weeks.
Workout 2: The Grind (Building Conditioning)
Once three rounds feels manageable, step it up.
5 rounds / 3 minutes each / 1 minute rest between rounds
- Round 1: Jab and movement. Circle left, jab. Circle right, jab. Stay on your toes.
- Round 2: Jab-cross, focus on power. Sit into every cross. Make the bag swing.
- Round 3: Body work only. Hooks and straights to the midsection of the bag. Stay low, stay compact.
- Round 4: Combination round. Jab-cross-hook. Jab-jab-cross. Jab-cross-hook-cross. Mix it up. Don’t stop moving.
- Round 5: Empty the tank. Last round, everything you’ve got. Fast hands, constant punching, don’t quit until the timer goes off.
That’s 20 minutes. Add a 5-minute warm-up and a 5-minute cooldown and you’ve got a 30-minute workout that outperforms an hour on the treadmill.
Workout 3: The Burner (Advanced Conditioning)
This one hurts. In a good way.
8 rounds / 3 minutes each / 30 seconds rest between rounds
- Rounds 1-2: Technical work. Jab, cross, hook combinations. Controlled pace, focus on form and footwork.
- Rounds 3-4: Power rounds. Every punch at full force. Make the bag move. Sit into your shots.
- Rounds 5-6: Speed rounds. Fast hands, constant output. Don’t worry about power — just keep your hands moving for the full three minutes.
- Rounds 7-8: War rounds. Everything you have left. Power and speed together. If you’re not completely gassed by the end of round 8, you weren’t working hard enough.
30 seconds rest between rounds is brutal. That’s intentional. This simulates the pace of an actual fight and builds the kind of cardiovascular conditioning that nothing else replicates.
Stretching and Mobility: What You’re Probably Skipping
Why the Heavy Bag Works
There’s no other single piece of equipment that does what a heavy bag does:
Full-body workout. Punching isn’t just arms. A proper punch starts in your feet, travels through your legs and hips, rotates through your core, and fires through your shoulder and fist. Every punch is a full kinetic chain movement. Three rounds on the bag and your legs, core, shoulders, back, and arms are all working.
Cardio without running. If you hate running, the heavy bag is your answer. Three-minute rounds with short rest periods spike your heart rate the same way interval training does — except you’re building functional strength at the same time.
Stress relief. There is nothing quite like hitting something after a long day. The bag absorbs whatever you throw at it. Bad day at work. Argument with someone. Frustration you can’t put into words. The bag takes it all. There’s a reason therapists are starting to recommend boxing-style workouts for anxiety, depression, and PTSD.
The Mental Health Benefits of Boxing Training
Low barrier to entry. A bag and gloves. That’s it. Hang it in your garage, your basement, your back porch. No commute to a gym. No waiting for equipment. No monthly membership. It’s there whenever you want it.
It scales with you. Day one, you’re throwing sloppy jabs and gassing out after two minutes. Six months later, you’re throwing crisp combinations for eight rounds. The bag grows with you. There’s no ceiling on how hard you can push yourself.
Beyond the Heavy Bag: Speed Bags and Double-End Bags
The heavy bag is the foundation. But once you’ve been training awhile, two other bags develop skills the heavy bag can’t.
The Speed Bag
That small, teardrop-shaped bag mounted at head height that you see fighters hitting in a blur. The speed bag doesn’t build power — that’s not the point. It builds timing, hand-eye coordination, rhythm, and shoulder endurance.
How it works: You hit the bag with the side of your fist in a circular rhythm. The bag bounces off the platform three times between each punch — front, back, front — and you hit it again on the return. It takes most people a few sessions to find the rhythm. Once you do, it’s almost meditative. The sound alone — that rapid-fire tatatatatatat — is one of the most recognizable sounds in any boxing gym.
What it trains: Your shoulders will burn before anything else. Keeping your hands up at head height for 3-minute rounds builds the endurance that keeps your guard up late in fights or long training sessions. It also develops hand speed, timing, and the ability to judge distance — your fist has to meet a small, fast-moving target on every rep.
Getting started: Stand close enough that your fists reach the belly of the bag with your elbows slightly bent. Start slow — one hit, wait for the three bounces, hit again. Speed comes with practice. Don’t try to go fast before you can go steady. Most speed bags come in small (for speed) or medium (easier to learn on). Start with a medium.
What to buy: A speed bag platform that mounts to a wall or a freestanding frame, plus the bag itself. Title and Everlast both make solid platforms and bags. A basic setup runs $80-150 for the platform and $20-40 for the bag.
The Double-End Bag
A small round bag connected to the floor and ceiling by elastic cords. When you hit it, it snaps back at you — fast. The double-end bag is the closest thing to a sparring partner that isn’t a human being.
How it works: The elastic cords make the bag rebound unpredictably after every punch. You throw a jab, the bag comes back at your face. You have to slip it, block it, or counter it. This forces you to punch and immediately get defensive — the exact skill that separates trained fighters from people who just swing.
What it trains: Accuracy, timing, reflexes, and defensive reactions. The heavy bag teaches you to hit hard. The double-end bag teaches you to hit accurately — and to not get hit back. It also builds rhythm and combination flow because you’re reacting to the bag’s movement rather than hitting a stationary target.
Getting started: Start with single shots. Jab. Wait for the bag to rebound, slip it, jab again. Once you can consistently land clean singles, start adding two-punch combinations — jab-cross, jab-jab. The bag moves fast and it’s humbling at first. You’ll miss more than you hit. That’s the point — it’s teaching your hands and eyes to sync up in real time.
What to buy: A double-end bag with adjustable elastic cords. They’re small, cheap, and easy to set up — you need an anchor point on the floor and ceiling. $20-50 for the bag plus cords. Title, Ringside, and Everlast all make them.
The Three-Bag Gym
If you have space for all three — heavy bag, speed bag, double-end bag — you have a complete striking gym. The heavy bag builds power and conditioning. The speed bag builds rhythm and shoulder endurance. The double-end bag builds accuracy and defensive reflexes. Rotate between them for a training session that covers everything.
One More Thing
You’re going to feel ridiculous the first time. You’ll feel uncoordinated. Your punches won’t look like what you see on TV. You’ll be winded embarrassingly fast. That’s fine. Everyone starts there.
The bag doesn’t judge. It doesn’t post your workout online. It doesn’t compare you to anyone. It just hangs there and waits for you to hit it.
So hit it.
Using a Heavy Bag for Cardio, Weight Loss, and Stress Relief
Boxing for Weight Loss: Why It Works Better Than You Think
Where to Buy:
- Cleto Reyes — Premium bag gloves and training gloves. The gold standard.
- Everlast — Solid entry-level gloves and heavy bags. Widely available.
- Title Boxing — Heavy bags, bag gloves, and hanging hardware.
- Ringside — Full range of bags and gloves at competitive prices.
