Barbell plate calculator
Say what you want the bar to weigh. This works out what goes on each side, heaviest plate first, with the bar itself already counted.
Which plates it assumes
Kilograms: 25, 20, 15, 10, 5, 2.5 and 1.25. Pounds: 45, 35, 25, 10, 5 and 2.5. The bar starts at 20 kg or 45 lb — change it for a women's bar, a safety squat bar or anything else you load.
Plate sets differ between gyms, and micro plates under 1.25 kg are left out because most racks do not have them. If the result comes up short, that is the closest bar you can actually load — not a rounding error.
Questions this raises
- How much does a barbell weigh?
- A standard olympic bar is 20 kg, which is 45 lb. A women's olympic bar is 15 kg, a training bar is often 10 kg, and specialty bars — safety squat, trap, swiss — run anywhere from 11 to 32 kg and are usually stamped or listed on the gym's wall. If you are not sure, weigh it once and remember the number; everything you load after that depends on it.
- Why can the bar not hit the exact weight I want?
- Because plates go on in pairs, so the bar can only move in steps of twice the smallest plate you have. With 1.25 kg plates that step is 2.5 kg; without them it is 5 kg. Anything between two steps is not a rounding error, it is a weight the rack cannot make — which is why this tells you how far short it lands instead of quietly moving the number.
The rock won't move itself.
Log the set instead of retyping it. The app keeps the history and draws the curve.
Last updated: