Can Pilates Replace Weight Training? What Women Need to Know

If you love Pilates but keep hearing that women must lift weights, you may be wondering whether your Pilates actually counts.

Can Pilates replace weight training?

The short answer is: sometimes, partly — but not always completely.

Pilates can absolutely challenge your muscles, improve aspects of strength and muscular endurance, and provide meaningful resistance through body weight, leverage, springs and controlled movement.

But if your goal is to maximise muscle growth or maximal strength, traditional resistance training has some clear advantages because it makes progressively increasing external load much easier.

The better question is not simply “Pilates or weights?”

It is:

What do you want your strength training to do for you?

Can Pilates Replace Weight Training?

For some people and some goals, Pilates can replace a significant amount of traditional weight training.

If your priorities are general strength, muscular endurance, trunk control, balance, mobility, coordination and staying physically capable, a well-programmed Pilates routine can contribute a great deal.

If your priorities are maximising muscle size, lifting the heaviest weights possible or progressively increasing external load over a long period, traditional resistance training is likely to offer advantages.

That does not make Pilates ineffective.

And it does not mean that a woman doing challenging Reformer Pilates several times a week is doing “no strength training.”

The effect depends on how demanding the exercises actually are.

Does Pilates Count as Strength Training?

It can.

Muscles do not know whether resistance came from a dumbbell, your body weight, gravity, a spring or the position of your limbs.

They respond to force and effort.

If an exercise requires a muscle to produce meaningful force, that muscle is being challenged.

Pilates can create resistance through:

• body weight
• gravity
• Reformer springs
• longer lever positions
• slow controlled movement
• isometric holds
• repeated muscular contractions
• reduced assistance
• greater range of motion
• more challenging exercise variations

So yes, Pilates can be strengthening.

But not every Pilates exercise is automatically a strength exercise, just as picking up a light dumbbell does not automatically create an effective strength program.

The Most Important Question: Is Your Pilates Actually Challenging You?

The label matters less than the training stimulus.

A gentle beginner Pilates class and a progressively challenging Reformer program are both called Pilates, but they may place very different demands on the body.

Ask yourself:

• Are the final repetitions genuinely challenging?
• Are you progressing to movements or resistance you could not manage several months ago?
• Are your legs, hips, trunk and upper body all receiving meaningful work across the week?
• Do exercises become more demanding as your ability improves?
• Or have you been doing exactly the same comfortable exercises at the same difficulty for a year?

Any exercise program can become too easy if it never progresses.

I Do Reformer Pilates Three Times a Week — Do I Still Need Weights?

This is probably the question many women are really asking.

If your three Reformer sessions are challenging your major muscle groups, progressing over time and requiring real muscular effort, you are not doing nothing for strength.

Quite the opposite.

You may be getting meaningful strength and endurance work from those sessions.

Whether you also benefit from traditional weights depends on what you want to achieve and whether your Pilates program leaves any obvious gaps.

If you simply want to feel stronger, move well, maintain physical capacity and enjoy exercising consistently, Reformer Pilates may already be doing a substantial amount of the job.

If you want to maximise muscle growth, significantly increase the amount of force you can produce, or progressively lift heavier loads, adding some traditional resistance training may broaden your training stimulus.

You do not necessarily have to replace Pilates.

You may simply add to it.

What Does the Science Say About Pilates and Strength?

A 2022 systematic review examined randomised controlled trials comparing Pilates with other forms of exercise for muscular strength, balance and flexibility.

The review found very-low to low-certainty evidence suggesting there was no clear difference between Pilates and other exercise modalities for dynamic strength, isometric strength or strength endurance.

Read the systematic review on Pilates and muscular strength

That does not prove Pilates is equally effective to every form of resistance training for every strength goal.

The studies were limited and varied considerably.

But it also does not support the idea that Pilates is merely stretching or that it cannot provide a meaningful muscular challenge.

More recently, a 2025 randomised controlled trial studied 47 women aged 30 to 60 with overweight or obesity.

After eight weeks of Reformer Pilates performed three times per week, the exercise group improved measures including upper-body strength and trunk endurance, along with several body-composition outcomes.

View the 2025 Reformer Pilates trial

It is an interesting finding, particularly for women in the age group many Pilates studios serve.

But it was also one relatively small, short study in a specific population, so it should not be turned into a claim that Reformer Pilates is universally equivalent to weight training.

Where Weight Training Has a Stronger Evidence Base

Traditional resistance training has been studied far more extensively for improving muscular strength and muscle mass.

A 2026 systematic review and meta-analysis examined 126 studies involving 4,019 women across adulthood, with an average age of approximately 51 years.

Resistance training significantly improved muscular strength in both premenopausal and postmenopausal women, and was also associated with improvements in body composition.

Read the 2026 systematic review of resistance training in women

Earlier female-specific evidence has also shown large improvements in upper- and lower-body strength and improvements in muscular hypertrophy following resistance training.

Read the systematic review of resistance training, strength and muscle growth in women

So if the question is:

“Which method has the stronger evidence for maximising strength and muscle?”

Traditional resistance training currently has the advantage.

That is different from saying Pilates does not strengthen you.

Can Pilates Build Muscle?

Yes, it can — particularly when the exercises provide enough resistance and are a sufficiently challenging stimulus for the person doing them.

This is especially plausible in beginners, people returning to exercise or anyone progressing into more demanding Pilates work.

But building some muscle and maximising muscle growth are not the same goal.

Traditional resistance training makes it much easier to deliberately increase load, track it and continue progressing it over time.

That makes weight training a very practical tool when muscle growth is a major priority.

So the more useful distinction is:

Pilates can build muscle. Weights make maximising muscle growth easier to programme and measure.

Getting Stronger Is Not the Same as Maximising Strength

This is one of the reasons the Pilates-versus-weights argument becomes so confusing.

A woman can absolutely become stronger through Pilates.

That does not mean Pilates will necessarily develop the maximum amount of strength she could achieve with a dedicated resistance-training program.

The two statements can both be true.

If you currently struggle with a movement and several months later you can perform it with greater resistance, better control or a harder variation, you have progressed.

But if your goal is to maximise how much external load you can squat, pull, press or lift, traditional weight training gives you a much more direct pathway.

What Is Progressive Overload?

Progressive overload simply means that the training challenge increases as your body adapts.

Without progression, an exercise that was once difficult eventually becomes familiar.

With weights, progression is easy to see.

You may move from:

5 kg → 7.5 kg → 10 kg.

Pilates progression can be less obvious, but it still exists.

You can progress an exercise by changing resistance, leverage, range, repetitions, tempo, stability demands, assistance or the exercise itself.

So it is inaccurate to say that Pilates cannot use progressive overload.

The more accurate statement is:

Weight training makes external load particularly easy to quantify and progressively increase.

Do Reformer Springs Count as Resistance?

Yes.

But Reformer springs are not simply dumbbells lying sideways.

Springs change tension as they lengthen, and their role varies according to the exercise.

In some exercises, more spring means you need to produce more force.

In others, stronger springs provide more assistance or stability.

Sometimes reducing the spring load makes an exercise much more difficult to control.

This is why:

The number of springs on your Reformer is not a strength score.

A four-spring exercise is not automatically “better” strength training than a two-spring exercise.

The direction of movement, body position, lever length and role of the springs all matter.

If you are new to the equipment, our guide to what Reformer Pilates is and how the machine actually works explains the major components in more detail.

Is Mat Pilates Strength Training Too?

It can be.

You do not need springs for Pilates to challenge muscular strength or endurance.

Mat Pilates uses your body weight, gravity and leverage to create resistance.

A long-leg abdominal exercise, side plank, push-up variation or controlled single-leg movement can be very demanding without a machine in sight.

And sometimes removing equipment makes an exercise harder because you have less support.

If you still picture Mat Pilates as little more than stretching, read Is Pilates Just Stretching? What Pilates Actually Does to Your Body.

Pilates vs Weight Training: Which Is Better?

Neither is automatically better.

They are tools with overlapping but different strengths.

And that final row matters more than it may appear.

The most scientifically perfect exercise program is not particularly useful if you dislike it so much that you rarely do it.

Does Pilates Count Toward Your Two Strength Days a Week?

Australia’s updated 2026 movement guidelines recommend adults perform muscle-strengthening activities on two or more days each week.

Read Australia’s current movement recommendations for adults

The guidelines also recommend functional activities targeting mobility, balance and coordination on three or more days each week, alongside regular moderate-to-vigorous and light physical activity.

Importantly, an activity does not stop being muscle strengthening simply because it does not involve a barbell.

The question is whether your muscles are actually working against a meaningful challenge.

So a sufficiently demanding Pilates session may contribute toward your muscle-strengthening activity.

That does not mean every gentle Pilates session automatically fulfils the guideline.

Intensity and exercise selection still matter.

Women Over 40: Do You Really Have to Lift Heavy Weights?

If you are in your 40s, 50s or 60s, you have probably heard increasingly urgent messages about strength training.

Some of that attention is justified.

Maintaining muscle and strength as we age matters for physical function and long-term independence, and resistance training has an excellent evidence base in women.

But that evidence often gets converted into an unnecessarily rigid social-media message:

“If you’re over 40, you must lift heavy weights or you’re doing exercise wrong.”

The research does not require that interpretation.

The 2026 meta-analysis involving more than 4,000 women found that resistance training improved strength across both premenopausal and postmenopausal groups.

View the research on resistance training across the female lifespan

That is an excellent reason to value resistance training.

It is not evidence that Pilates suddenly becomes useless when you turn 40.

If your Pilates is meaningfully challenging your muscles, it can still contribute to your strength, movement and physical capacity.

And if you want a greater strength stimulus, you can add it without giving up the form of exercise you enjoy.

What About Women in Their 60s and Beyond?

Pilates research in older adults is mixed, which is another reason to avoid exaggerated claims.

A 2021 systematic review and meta-analysis of 39 studies found favourable effects on measures including strength, balance, flexibility and physical function compared with habitual activity or non-exercise controls.

Read the systematic review of Pilates in older adults

However, a more recent review focusing specifically on strength, endurance and muscle power in adults over 60 concluded that the evidence was not strong enough to recommend Pilates specifically as a method for improving those outcomes.

Read the 2024 review of Pilates, strength and endurance in older adults

That is a good example of why we should not cherry-pick one favourable study and declare the question settled.

The broader message remains:

Staying physically active and maintaining strength matters. Pilates can be one tool, but it does not need to be your only tool.

What About Bone Health?

Bone health is another reason women are often told to lift weights as they get older.

It is an important topic, but it is also one where broad fitness claims can get ahead of the evidence.

Not all resistance produces the same loading stimulus to bone.

And simply being on a Reformer does not automatically mean your skeleton is receiving the same loading stimulus it would receive from progressively loaded resistance exercise or other appropriate weight-bearing activity.

So I would not use Pilates as a reason to dismiss other forms of loading if bone health is an important goal for you.

If you have osteoporosis, osteopenia or another health condition affecting exercise choices, individual advice from an appropriately qualified healthcare professional may also be important.

Does Pilates Only Work the “Small Stabilising Muscles”?

No.

This is another fitness myth that makes the difference between Pilates and weights sound much simpler than it really is.

Pilates can involve your quadriceps, hamstrings, glutes, calves, shoulders, arms, back muscles and trunk musculature.

Weights can also require balance, stabilisation and trunk control.

The difference is not:

Pilates = little muscles.

Weights = big muscles.

What matters more is the exercise being performed, the resistance, the person’s relative effort, the volume and how the program progresses.

Does Pilates Create “Long, Lean Muscles”?

You will still hear this phrase used in Pilates marketing.

But exercise does not physically lengthen your muscles into a special Pilates body shape.

Muscle shape is influenced by anatomy and genetics, while how defined someone looks is influenced by both muscle development and body fat.

Pilates can train muscles.

It can help you become stronger and more capable.

But we do not need the promise of “long, lean muscles” to make Pilates worthwhile.

When Pilates May Be Enough for Your Goals

Pilates may form most of your strength-focused exercise if your priorities are things like:

• becoming generally stronger
• building muscular endurance
• developing trunk strength and control
• improving balance and coordination
• moving through useful ranges with control
• returning to exercise after a long break
• finding exercise you genuinely enjoy enough to keep doing

This assumes your program continues to challenge you rather than remaining permanently at an introductory level.

And there is nothing wrong with enjoying Pilates as your main form of structured exercise while adding walking, running, classes or other activity around it.

When Adding Weights Makes Sense

Traditional resistance training becomes especially useful when you want to:

• maximise muscular strength
• maximise muscle growth
• progressively increase external load in a measurable way
• develop strength in movements not being sufficiently challenged by your Pilates program
• create greater loading options as Pilates exercises become easier for you

This does not need to mean giving up Reformer Pilates and living in a gym.

Even a relatively small amount of well-programmed resistance training can sit alongside the Pilates you already enjoy.

Can You Do Pilates and Weight Training Together?

Absolutely.

For many women, that may be the most useful answer to the entire debate.

You do not need to choose a team.

You could use Pilates for controlled resistance, muscular endurance, mobility, balance and movement variety, while using traditional resistance training for heavier and easily measurable progressive loading.

The exact balance depends on your goals, schedule, experience and — importantly — what you enjoy enough to sustain.

If you are already doing Pilates several times each week, adding strength training does not necessarily mean adding another four gym sessions.

Your routine should fit your life.

Strength training is also only one part of a broader exercise picture. If you’re wondering where cardiovascular exercise fits alongside strength and Pilates, our guide to cardio vs strength training for women explains what each develops and how to build a balanced approach around your goals, preferences and available time.

What if You Hate Lifting Weights?

Then I would not tell you that all of your Pilates suddenly “doesn’t count.”

Exercise exists on a spectrum.

A woman doing challenging Pilates consistently is likely getting much more useful training than someone with a theoretically perfect resistance program she never performs.

You can also explore different ways to create resistance.

Dumbbells are one option.

Machines are another.

Bands, body-weight exercises, group strength classes and Pilates can all contribute depending on how they are used.

You do not have to love the gym to care about becoming stronger.

What if You Love Lifting Weights?

Keep lifting.

Pilates does not need to replace something that is already working well for you.

It may instead give you another way to train movement, trunk control, balance, coordination and strength through different positions.

Some women find the two styles complement each other beautifully.

Others simply prefer one over the other.

There is no prize for choosing the “correct” fitness identity.

Can Pilates Replace the Gym?

That depends entirely on why you go to the gym.

If your gym routine is primarily there to make you generally stronger, keep you moving and give you structured exercise, a sufficiently challenging Pilates program may satisfy many of those goals.

If your gym program is designed specifically around progressive heavy resistance, maximal strength or substantial hypertrophy, Pilates is unlikely to reproduce it exactly.

Again:

the goal determines the answer.

So Which Is Better for Women: Pilates or Weights?

For most women, I do not think this is the most useful question.

A better question is:

What combination of movement gives you the physical qualities you want while still being realistic enough to become part of your life?

If you adore Pilates and dread lifting weights, you do not have to abandon the exercise you love because someone online says it does not count.

If you love lifting heavy, Pilates does not need to replace it either.

And if you like both?

Even better.

You have more than one useful tool.

How Often Should You Do Pilates for Strength?

There is no universal number of weekly Pilates sessions that guarantees a particular strength outcome.

Frequency is only one part of the equation.

Intensity, exercise selection, resistance, progression, recovery and the rest of your training all matter.

If you’re trying to work out where Pilates should fit into your week, read our guide to how often you should do Pilates to see results.

What the Research Really Tells Us

The research does not support a simple internet battle where one side wins and the other loses.

Pilates research shows that it can challenge and improve aspects of muscular performance, although the evidence base is smaller and often lower certainty than the resistance-training literature.

2022 systematic review: Pilates compared with other exercise for muscular strength

2025 randomised trial: Reformer Pilates in women aged 30–60

Resistance training, meanwhile, has a substantial evidence base showing improvements in strength and body composition in women across adulthood.

2026 systematic review and meta-analysis: resistance training in women across the lifespan

And Australia’s current movement recommendations encourage adults to include muscle-strengthening activity at least twice each week alongside aerobic, functional and everyday movement.

Australian 24-hour movement guidelines for adults

The evidence gives us options, not fitness tribes.

The Good News: You Probably Do Not Have to Choose

Pilates can make you stronger.

Weight training can make you stronger.

They simply give you different ways to create and progress physical challenge.

For some women, a challenging Pilates program may provide most of the strengthening they want.

For others, adding traditional weights may help them develop more muscle, greater strength or heavier loading capacity.

And for many women, the ideal routine may contain both.

Your exercise program should serve your life — not become another set of rules you’re failing to follow.

How We Approach Strength at Bodi Boutique

At Bodi Boutique, we do not see Pilates and strength training as opposing camps.

They are tools.

What matters is what we are asking your body to do, how challenging that task is for you and whether the program continues to progress as you become stronger.

Sometimes that challenge comes from body weight.

Sometimes from Reformer springs.

Sometimes from leverage, tempo or control.

And sometimes traditional resistance training is exactly the right tool.

We want women to feel stronger and more capable without believing there is only one “correct” way to exercise.

Want to Build Strength Without Feeling Intimidated?

If you are curious about Pilates or Reformer Pilates but have wondered whether it will genuinely challenge you, the best way to understand it is to experience a properly programmed session.

Bodi Boutique offers small-group Pilates and Reformer Pilates classes in Millmerran, with options for women at different levels of experience.

You do not need to already be strong.

You do not need to know the exercises.

And you do not have to choose between moving well and becoming stronger.

Explore Pilates & Reformer Pilates at Bodi Boutique

If you want dedicated strength work alongside Pilates, explore Bodi Boutique’s Group Fitness classes for coached small-group options.

You May Also Like

Pilates With Weights: Is It Better Than Pilates Without Weights? — a practical guide to using dumbbells, bands and other resistance within Pilates.

Is Pilates Just Stretching? What Pilates Actually Does to Your Body

What Is Reformer Pilates? How It Works, Benefits & What to Expect

Mat Pilates vs Reformer Pilates: Which Is Better for You?

How Often Should You Do Pilates to See Results?

Pilates for Beginners: What to Expect From Your First Class

What Does “Engage Your Core” Actually Mean? How It Should Feel

About the Author

Jazz — Bodi Boutique

Jazz is a qualified fitness and Pilates instructor and the owner of Bodi Boutique, a small-group fitness, Pilates, Reformer Pilates and wellness studio in Millmerran, Queensland.

Through Bodi Boutique, Jazz works with women across different ages, fitness levels and exercise backgrounds, with a focus on making movement approachable, progressive and enjoyable.

Learn more about Bodi Boutique