Deep squat test
Squat as low as you can, settle there for thirty seconds, and read the band that matches what happened. It is the widest-reaching test in the battery, it needs nothing but floor, and it scores 0–100 on Limber’s own scale.
How to take the reading
- Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, toes forward or turned out a little.
- Squat as low as you can with your arms forward for balance. Take it slowly. Stop at a stretch, never at sharp pain.
- Settle at the bottom and breathe. Note how deep you got and where your heels are.
- Stay for about thirty seconds if you can, then choose the band below.
The thirty seconds are the test, not a formality. Limber captures this one as a guided half-minute hold because the difference between the top two bands is not depth at all — it is whether the bottom of the squat is somewhere you can rest or somewhere you are holding on. Drop in and stand straight back up and you cannot tell those apart.
Take it barefoot or in flat shoes, and take it the same way every time. A raised heel changes the ankle demand enough to move you a whole band, which is a real change in the test and not a real change in you.
Hold on to a doorframe if you need to for safety, but read the band you reach without pulling on it. A supported squat and a free squat are two different readings.
What each band scores
| Band | What happened at the bottom | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | I can't reach parallel | 15 |
| 2 | Parallel, heels lifted | 40 |
| 3 | Full squat, heels down | 70 |
| 4 | A comfortable resting squat | 90 |
Parallel means the crease of the hip level with the top of the knee. Heels down means both heels in contact with the floor and staying there, not touching down for a moment while you balance.
What a squat actually measures
Ankles, knees, hips and the lower back, all at once, plus balance and how familiar the position is. That breadth is why it is the app’s global lower-body screen and why one reading from it feeds three separate areas. It is also why it cannot tell you which link was the short one: a squat that stops at parallel with the heels lifting looks the same whether the ankle, the hip or the practice is the limit.
The knee-to-wall test is the usual next question, because a lifting heel is very often an ankle story. Macrum and colleagues showed in the Journal of Sport Rehabilitation in 2012 that restricting ankle dorsiflexion changes squat mechanics measurably, which is a good reason to measure the ankle rather than assume it.
Depth is also partly bone. Hip socket depth and femoral neck angle differ from person to person, and neither is something practice or stretching alters. Some people will never sit comfortably at the bottom of a squat, and that is information about their hips rather than a verdict on their effort.
0 of 5 tests taken. Every link here carries what you have already measured, so the readings travel with you from one instrument to the next.
Nothing on this site is stored and nothing is sent. Your readings live in the address bar and nowhere else, so a link is a survey and closing the tab loses it. Copy the address if you want to keep it, or take the same tests in Limber, where a reading is kept on the phone and measured against the one before it.
Stop at a stretch, never at sharp pain. Deep aching in the front of the hip, a pinch at the front of the ankle, or knee pain that arrives at a particular depth is not a stretch — come out of the position rather than pushing for the next band.
See a clinician rather than a web page if a knee or hip locks, catches or gives way, if there is swelling, if the joint was injured recently, or if pain radiates down the leg with numbness, pins and needles or weakness. This test does not diagnose anything and Limber does not treat anything.
What is a good deep squat test score?
A full squat with the heels down reads 70 and is a genuinely good adult result. A comfortable resting squat — one you can stay in and breathe — reads 90. Parallel with the heels lifting reads 40, and not reaching parallel reads 15. The anchors are Limber's own scale, built so the gap between two of your readings means something rather than so you can rank against strangers.
Why do my heels lift when I squat?
Very often the ankle, though a squat cannot tell you that on its own — it sees ankles, knees, hips and lower back all at once. The knee-to-wall test is the way to find out rather than guess. Macrum and colleagues showed in the Journal of Sport Rehabilitation in 2012 that restricting ankle dorsiflexion changes squat mechanics measurably.
Why does the test ask for thirty seconds?
Because the difference between the top two bands is not depth, it is whether the bottom of the squat is somewhere you can rest or somewhere you are holding on. Drop in and stand straight back up and you cannot tell those apart. Limber captures this test as a guided half-minute hold for exactly that reason.
Will I ever be able to sit at the bottom of a squat?
Possibly, and possibly not. Hip socket depth and femoral neck angle differ from person to person, and neither is something practice or stretching alters. Some people will not sit comfortably at the bottom of a squat however they train, and that is information about their hips rather than a verdict on their effort.
Can I hold on to something?
Hold a doorframe if you need it for safety, but read the band you reach without pulling on it. A supported squat and a free squat are two different readings, and mixing them between sessions is the quickest way to make the number meaningless.
What does this reading feed?
More than any other test in the battery: all of the glutes area as a proxy, half of the hips area and half of the lower-back area — which puts it into two of the five groups the Range Score averages. That breadth is why it cannot tell you which part of what it saw was the limit, and why the other four tests exist.
The composite. Whatever you have measured, rolled into one 0–100 reading and drawn as an elevation profile — with the ground you skipped left dashed.
Knee to Wall TestAnkle dorsiflexion in centimetres, left and right kept apart. One of two tests in the battery that produce a real measured number.
Hip Flexor TestHip flexor length on each side, read against the bench line — the Thomas test, simplified so you can take it alone.
- Macrum E, Bell DR, Boling M, Lewek M, Padua D. Effect of limiting ankle-dorsiflexion range of motion on lower extremity kinematics and muscle-activation patterns during a squat. Journal of Sport Rehabilitation 2012;21(2):144–50. doi:10.1123/jsr.21.2.144
- Hemmerich A, Brown H, Smith S, Marthandam SS, Wyss UP. Hip, knee, and ankle kinematics of high range of motion activities of daily living. Journal of Orthopaedic Research 2006;24(4):770–81. doi:10.1002/jor.20114
Each address was followed to the record it names before it was written down. Where a paper could not be resolved that way, the page names it in the prose and leaves it unlinked rather than guessing at an address.
One reading is a point. Two are a line.
This page scores one test. Limber runs five — toe touch, knee-to-wall, shoulder reach, hip flexor and deep squat — rolls them into a single 0–100 Range Score, cuts that first score as your datum, and measures every later reading from it. The two wall tests are read in centimetres, the per-side tests keep left and right apart, and areas you never tested stay drawn as untested rather than filled in with a guess.
It works offline and needs no account: your readings stay on the phone.
Limber is in build. There is no store listing yet, so there is no download button here — when there is one it will be a link, not a promise.