How To Avoid Knee Pain During Squats: Common Causes and Tips for Strength Training

The squat is arguably the mac daddy of lower body exercises and is extremely effective for strengthening those lower body muscles and joints. Not to mention, it’s a basic functional movement pattern — something we do in our everyday life.

Whether it’s in your workouts or just living normal life, we bend and lift (squat) a LOT. Because of this, it’s important to correct improper form if you’re experiencing pain, rather than avoid squatting altogether.

Pain or discomfort in the knees during squats is a common problem that can usually be fixed with a few tweaks in positioning, form or equipment.

In this blog post, I’ll be giving tips for someone who is squatting a light to moderate weight. So, if you’re a power lifter or are squatting your body weight or more, you hopefully already know these basic tips.

Knee Pain During Squats

If you experience knee pain during your squat, you’re not alone. Let’s talk about some common issues that can lead to discomfort while squatting and also things we can do to fix them.

1. Not Engaging Your Core

But wait, we’re working lower body in the squat, right?

Yes, the primary lower body muscles — quads, glutes, hamstrings, calves and adductors are all hard at work to perform a squat. But the commonly overlooked muscle group is the core muscles of your abdominals, obliques and lower back.

Bracing your core in your squat helps keep your position centered and your spine neutral which is key in performing a strong squat. Performing a squat (especially a weighted squat) without engaging your core can lead to a lot of different issues.

As you lower into your squat, take a deep breath in (this is your eccentric contraction as you lower). As you power up out of your squat, exhale (this is your concentric contraction as you lift the weight).

Sometimes breathing correctly can automatically help you engage the core but I’ll also coach this by saying, “imagine someone’s going to punch you in the gut.” If you know you’re going to get punched in the gut, your reaction is likely to tighten it up.

2. Improper Footing

Your feet are the base of your squat and if they’re not in the correct position, it transcends throughout your whole lower body. It turns out that the “Bones” song we learned as a child (the foot bone’s connected to the leg bone, the leg bone’s connected to the knee bone…) is actually factual.

Having the right shoes can help too, but let’s talk about your actual footing. (For everyday gym-goers, cross training shoes with a firm, flat base are good for lifting.)

During your squat, make sure your feet are flat and “anchored” into the floor. Putting more pressure on the insides of your feet can cause the knees to cave in and can load up your kneecaps rather than your muscles. Ouch.

Let’s talk more about knees caving in.

3. Knee’s Are Caving In

If you find you’re having a hard time keeping your knees from caving in, you could be tight in your adductors (inner thigh muscles) or in some less common cases, you may have knee valgus — although I find with a little coaching, knees caving in can usually be corrected easily.

If your adductors are tight, there are plenty of stretches you can do to loosen them up.

When you come into a wide squat stance, position your feet outside of the hips and turn your toes out slightly. (Not like penguin feet. Just a little bit.)

As you lower into your squat, focus on pushing your knees outwards. The knees should be tracking with your outside toes. Remember, feet stay flat on the ground!

4. Knees Are Pushing Too Far Over The Toes

I can understand why people get confused with this one because I’m sure you’ve heard a trainer or instructor say, “Knees over the toes!”

In a mid-stance squat (feet under the hips) you do want to focus on pushing the knees forward to target your quads. However, if your knees push past the toes, which commonly happens, you’re now putting a ton of pressure in your knees.

I find that most of the time when someone is pushing their knees too far past the toes, it’s actually because they’re not pushing their hips back and down, resulting in a forward lean.

To properly load the quads and keep the pressure from your knees, focus on pushing your hips BACK and DOWN. If the hips don’t go back but the body descends, those knees are forced to push out over the toes and will result in loaded kneecaps, not loaded quads.

5. Stance Is Too Narrow

If you’re new to squatting or have preexisting injuries, I suggest keeping your squats wide to set up a bigger base. The wide squat is more glute-focused than quad-focused but it’s easier on the hips and knees.

Perfect your form with a wide squat and keep it light to start. Once you feel confident in your wide squats, try transitioning to a mid-stance squat.

6. Putting The Weight In Your Toes

It’s an easy mistake to make if you’re not used to squatting. As you lower into your squat, focus on sinking back into your heels. As you’re coming up out of the squat, focus on driving through the heels.

If you’re sinking into the toes as you lower and pushing through your toes as you lift, chances are you’re also doing one of the above mistakes as well.

To fire up those hamstrings and glutes, and to have proper alignment, think about putting the weight to the back of the body and into your heels.

This is a super common mistake in squatting but once you make the fix, it could change your whole squat game. If you think you might be putting the weight in your toes, try box squats. This will teach you how to sink back and down with your hips and put the weight into your heels.

Another technique to try are squats with an exercise ball up against a wall.

7. Weak Core And/Or Glutes

Your core and glutes play a major role in a squat. If your form is spot on and you’re lifting appropriate weight but you’re still having knee pain, the culprit could be your core and/or glutes. We should always be looking to strengthen our core as it’s the foundation of our limb’s movements.

Look for additional ways to strengthen your glutes (there’s a gazillion) so that your squats are powerful and pain free.