A 15-Minute Full-Body Home Workout, No Weights

This is a complete full-body session that needs about two square metres of floor and no weights at all. It takes roughly fifteen minutes. Most of it is silent, which makes it the workout to fall back on when a flat, a shared house or a sleeping baby rules everything else out.

General fitness guidance, not medical advice. If you have an injury or a health condition, check with a qualified professional before starting.

What you need

• A pair of core sliders — these do most of the work
• A training mat, or carpet
• Optional: a doorway pull-up bar for the pulling movement
• Optional: a jump rope if you have the ceiling height and forgiving neighbours

Check your floor first. Dual-sided sliders have a hard face for carpet and a felt face for hardwood and tile, but on deep pile or shag carpet neither face slides properly — and every movement below depends on them sliding.

Warm-up (2 minutes)

Do not skip this. Slider work loads your shoulders and hamstrings through a long range, and cold joints do not like that.

• 30 seconds: arm circles, both directions
• 30 seconds: bodyweight squats, slow
• 30 seconds: hip hinges, hands on hips
• 30 seconds: slow mountain climbers, no sliders yet

The session

Two rounds. 40 seconds work, 20 seconds rest between movements, 60 seconds between rounds.

1. Slider mountain climbers

Plank position, one slider under each foot. Drive one knee towards your chest, then swap. Keep your hips level — the moment they start bouncing you are going too fast.

Common error: letting the hips rise. Your body should stay one straight line from heel to head.

2. Slider reverse lunge

Stand with one slider under your back foot. Slide that foot backwards into a lunge, then pull it back in under control. All the work is in the front leg. Half the time each side.

Common error: pushing off the back foot to stand up. The back leg is a passenger.

3. Pull-ups or chin-ups

If you have a doorway bar, this is where it earns its place — nothing else at home trains pulling strength properly. Multiple grip positions let you switch between wide, narrow and neutral as you fatigue.

Cannot do a full rep yet? Do negatives: jump or step up to the top position, then lower yourself as slowly as you can. Three slow negatives beat ten half reps. No bar? Substitute slider body rows — lie face up, heels on the mat, and drag yourself along the floor using your elbows.

4. Slider pike

Plank position, sliders under both feet. Keeping your legs straight, pull your feet in towards your hands so your hips rise into an inverted V. Lower back down under control.

This is the hardest movement here. If it is too much, bend your knees and tuck them to your chest instead — same movement, shorter lever.

5. Slider hamstring curl

Lie on your back, sliders under both heels, hips lifted into a bridge. Slide your heels away until your legs are almost straight, then pull them back in without letting your hips drop.

Almost nothing else you can do at home trains the hamstrings through this range. Expect to feel it two days later the first time.

6. Conditioning finisher

Skip rope for the full 40 seconds if you have the clearance — you want around 8ft of ceiling. A rope with a counter is genuinely useful here, because you stop losing count at forty and starting again.

If skipping is out — low ceiling, thin floors, sleeping neighbours — substitute fast slider climbers or high knees. You lose the rhythm, not the training effect. This is the only loud movement in the session, and it is the easiest one to swap.

Cool down (2 minutes)

Chest stretch in a doorway, standing hamstring stretch, and a slow child's pose. If you sit at a desk all day, this is also the point in the session where the rounded-forward posture you arrived with is worth addressing rather than ignoring.

Making it harder

There is no heavier band or bigger weight to reach for here, which is a feature. In order: slow the return phase to three seconds, then add a pause at the hardest point, then shorten the rest to 15 seconds, then add a third round.

Slider work scales through control rather than load. A slow, controlled pike is far harder than a fast one, and considerably better for you.

How often

Three times a week on non-consecutive days is plenty alongside normal activity. On the days between, ten minutes of mobility is worth more than another session.

New to training at home? Start with how much space you actually need, then what to buy and in what order.