The Only 6 Stretches You Need to Loosen Up Tight Hips

What’s the worst part of having tight hips? Is it walking like the Tin Man? The nighttime achiness? The extra effort required to fully transition from a seated to a standing position?

As bad as all of that is, we’d venture to say that it’s the persistence of tight hips that makes them particularly intolerable. You may be able to temporarily loosen their death grip on your pelvis with stretching, mobility, and massage, but keeping tight hips loose feels like a fool’s errand. One workout or day-long stint at the computer, and you’re right back to (a very rigid) square one.

If this sounds all too familiar, rest assured: You don’t have to live with chronically tight hips. Chances are, you just need to swap your go-to hip stretches for more effective ones. Or, you need to improve your technique. So, if you’re still doing the same warmup you learned from your J.V. track coach, keep reading.

To better understand what causes tight hips and how to get them moving more freely with the best stretches for tight hips, we spoke with physical therapists Grayson Wickham, PT, DPT, founder of Movement Vault, and Hilary Granat, PT, DPT, owner of C.O.R.E. Physical Therapy. Here’s what you need to know.

What causes tight hips in the first place?

Tight hips can manifest in a few different ways, Granat says. “It can be limited range of motion in the hips, pain in the hip area, and it can even lead to back pain, or vice versa,” meaning lower back issues can trigger hip tightness, she says. You may feel discomfort or pain during activity, but tight hips may also bother you when you’re standing, sitting, or at rest.

Wickham explains that tightness in any muscle is typically physical, neurological, or a combination of both. “Over time, the body adapts to the positions and postures you spend the most time in,” he says. Unfortunately, most of us sit in chairs all day, which puts our hip flexors and hamstrings in a shortened position, often rendering them tight and weak.

From a neurological perspective, tight hips may be caused by low-level muscle contractions your brain is sending to “protect” you. Your nervous system remembers past injuries, Wickham says, and will use tightness to keep the body from moving in ways that feel threatening. It will also guard you against your own weakness and instability.

So, if you sit a lot and stick to the same movement patterns (most people live in the sagittal, or forward/backward, plane and rarely move in a side-to-side or rotational pattern), your nervous system will do its best to limit your range of motion to what it knows you can do. In other words, tight hips are your body’s way of pumping the brakes whenever potential danger lies ahead.

The benefits of stretching for tight hips

Stretching your hips—which encompass your hip flexors, glutes, quadriceps, adductors, and hamstrings—can help improve hip mobility and alleviate pain and feelings of tightness—but only if you do it correctly.

Wickham strongly recommends active stretching over passive stretching. In a passive stretch, you collapse into a position and allow gravity and the weight of your body to do the work. Active stretching is different in that it requires you to contract the target muscle once you’ve maximally stretched it.

“You’re proving to your nervous system that you’re actually pretty stable in that position and maybe you really don’t need to have all these brakes on,” Wickham says.

Self-myofascial release (aka foam rolling) works similarly. Trigger points, which are painful nodules or “knots” that form in muscle tissue and fascia, are areas where increased muscle tone is concentrated. Applying pressure to these areas sends feedback to the nervous system, causing it to decrease muscle tone.

While active stretching and self-myofascial release can be beneficial to people with tight hips, it’s sometimes not enough to address the underlying issues.

“If your hips are always feeling tight and stretching them hasn’t worked, it could be that they need to be strengthened. A lot of the time, we tend to put too much emphasis on stretching tight muscles instead of strengthening, especially the hip flexors,” Granat says. “A muscle that is weak can feel tight when there is a lack of motor control and strength.”

The best stretches for tight hips

The following exercises, demonstrated by Wickham, use self-myofascial release and active stretching. You’ll need an exercise mat, foam roller, and mobility ball (a tennis or lacrosse ball will also work).