Average Pull-Ups: Why It's Hard to Answer With One Number, and How Many Pull-Ups Is Good by Marine Corps PFT and Service Academy Standards (2026)

2026.10.16

Average pull-ups are hard to answer with a single number. The figure shifts with who was tested and what rules the reps were counted by, and none of the sources found while researching this post gave an average pull-up count that represents adults in general.

So this post works from two sources you can trace instead. One is the pull-up records of just over 30,000 people tested during Norway's conscript selection. The other is the official scoring tables of the U.S. Marine Corps Physical Fitness Test and the U.S. service academies' admissions fitness test. At the end is where PULL UP KING starts you based on your current count. What counts as one full rep, and the question of momentum and half reps, is covered separately in the pull-up form post.

Why average pull-ups are hard to pin to one number #

The first reason is who gets tested. In a study comparing pull-up counts by thumb position (Di Bartolo et al., 2023), 95 physically active men averaged 14.2 reps with an open grip and 13.9 with a closed grip. But the study only took healthy men who could already do at least 5 pull-ups. Anyone who couldn't do a single rep had no way in, so that figure of around 14 shouldn't be read as the average for men.

The second is how the reps were counted. The three sources below also differ on rules like grip and time limits. The author of the Norwegian study wrote that its pull-up protocol was designed for conscript selection, so comparing it against other reference data may be difficult.

Third, some averages simply aren't published. The admissions fitness test pages from the U.S. Naval Academy and West Point (the U.S. Military Academy) list the maximum pull-up score, but not an average.

The closest thing to average pull-ups: 30,000 people at Norway's conscript selection #

Norway has conscription for both men and women, and it selects in two steps. At 17, everyone fills out an online questionnaire about things like health and fitness (step one). Based on those answers, about a third are sent each year to a conscript selection center for a day of medical checks and fitness testing (step two). Aandstad (2021), of the Norwegian Defence University College, used the step-two records to publish reference values for ages 17 to 21. Pull-ups were tested from fall 2017 through spring 2019: 18,847 men and 11,927 women.

Here's how it was measured. You hang from a beam with an overhand grip, arms and legs straight, and one rep means raising your chin over the beam and lowering until your arms are fully straight. Kicking or swinging the body wasn't accepted. Anyone who couldn't do a single one of these vertical, hanging pull-ups was tested on horizontal pull-ups instead: heels on a bench so the body starts out horizontal, then pulling with the body held straight until the chest touches the underside of the beam.

Pull-up scores were skewed to one side, so the paper reported medians and percentiles instead of averages. A percentile is a position in the lineup when everyone's scores are sorted from lowest to highest. The men's 50th percentile (the median) being 7 means roughly half did 7 or fewer, and the 90th being 13 means roughly nine in ten did 13 or fewer.

Cells without "horizontal" are vertical pull-ups. The horizontal test was only given to people who couldn't do a single vertical pull-up, so the men's 10th percentile landing on horizontal pull-ups means at least one man in ten couldn't do one vertical pull-up. For women, the results stayed on horizontal pull-ups all the way up to the 80th percentile (12 horizontal), so at least eight in ten did zero vertical pull-ups. The 90th percentile was 2 and the 95th was 4.

These numbers can't simply stand in for an adult average either. People who said on the step-one questionnaire that their strength or endurance was lower than their peers' were less likely to make it to step two, so the author wrote that the data are somewhat skewed toward higher values than a fully representative sample of the general population would be. The ages are also only 17 to 21.

How many pull-ups is good? The Marine Corps PFT scoring table #

Instead of an average, you can measure yourself against an official scoring table. The U.S. Marine Corps Physical Fitness Test (PFT) is taken every year, between January and June, by all active-duty Marines, and it has three events. For the upper-body event, Marines choose between pull-ups and push-ups. The standards are in Marine Corps Order 6100.13A, and the table below is the pull-up scoring table from the version that includes the 2022 change and the May 2025 administrative change.

Depending on age, men start scoring at 3 to 5 reps and max out at 18 to 23. Women start scoring at 1 to 4 and max out at 4 to 12. Three things to know when you read the table:

• The minimum isn't a passing score. Passing takes at least 150 points across the three events, and the order states that the minimum in each event won't add up to a passing score. Falling short of the minimum in any one event fails the whole test, no matter the total. Out of 300 points, a first-class score is 235 or more, second class is 200 to 234, and third class is 150 to 199.
• Reps in between have scores too. For men 17 to 20, 10 reps is 63 points and 15 is 81. For men 21 to 25, 10 is 57 points and 15 is 73.
• Only pull-ups can earn the upper-body max. Push-ups top out at 70 points. The order encourages all Marines to do pull-ups, calling them a better field test of upper-body strength.

Marines can grip the bar with their palms facing either forward or back. One rep starts from a hang with the arms fully extended, raises the chin above the bar, and lowers back down until the arms are fully extended. There's no time limit; you keep going until you drop off the bar. Whipping or kicking the body or legs, or kipping, isn't allowed, and if it's seen, that rep doesn't count.

In December 2025, the Marine Corps announced that starting January 1, 2026, combat arms Marines, regardless of sex, must score at least 210 points (70% of the total) on the order's male age-based scoring tables. Marines outside combat arms keep the existing sex- and age-based standards.

The service academy fitness test: max is 18 for men, 7 for women #

According to the U.S. Naval Academy, the Candidate Fitness Assessment (CFA) is a six-event test developed to evaluate candidates for three academies, the Naval Academy, the Air Force Academy, and the Military Academy, and the results are used in each academy's admissions process.

The pull-up starts from a still hang with the arms fully extended and an overhand grip (backs of the hands facing you). No swinging, kicking, or bicycling the legs, and the jaw line has to rise above the bar, parallel to the ground. When your chin rises above the bar, the scorer calls "Down," and when your arms are fully extended, "Up," and you do each rep on that cadence. The event ends after 2 minutes, and because the max is 18 for men and 7 for women, you stop once you reach that number, even before the 2 minutes are up.

Women do a flexed-arm hang instead only if they can't do a single pull-up. The Naval Academy's page notes that one pull-up scores higher than the best possible flexed-arm hang.

Ten reps aren't always the same ten: comparing a count from the app #

Ten reps in these three sources aren't ten reps of the same work. As covered above, the Marine Corps accepts either palm direction and has no time limit, the academies require an overhand grip within 2 minutes, and in Norway people hung from a beam rather than a bar, with an overhand grip. How your grip can change your count is covered in the chin-up vs. pull-up post.

A count from PULL UP KING can't be set straight against these tables either. The app counts a rep when your chin crosses not the bar but the judging line, a dashed line drawn just below the bar at about elbow height. The line sits below the bar on purpose: camera angle and joint detection both carry some error, and judging exactly at the bar would throw away reps done properly. The app also doesn't judge whether you used momentum, or whether your arms got fully straight at the bottom.

So a rep where your chin stops a little short of the bar, or one where you used momentum, can still count as one in the app if it crosses the judging line, and the Marine Corps PFT doesn't count reps like that. Use the app's count as your own record, measured by the same rule every set. To compare yourself with a scoring table, film from the side and count separately, checking every rep for whether your chin cleared the bar and your arms fully straightened at the bottom. Filming a set from the side to check each rep is also covered in the pull-up form post.

Where you start from your current count: PULL UP KING's level test #

PULL UP KING sets your starting level from one number: your count right now. The level test is a single set, done until you can't do another. You grab the bar, keep going until you can't pull up again, and lower both hands to finish. The camera counts the reps with the same judging it uses during workouts.

When you first start, if you can do at least one bodyweight rep, you're placed at the level whose prescribed first set is closest to 75% of that count. The app's explanation is that you shouldn't spend everything on the first set, so that you can still fill the remaining four. For example, 12 reps on the level test starts you at level 22 (9-7-6-5-5), where the first set is 9. One rep puts you at level 13 (1-1-1-1-1), five sets of one bodyweight rep. And if you answer that you can't do one yet, you skip the test and start at level 1 with a strong band.

Following the numbers up through the levels, the first level with 10 on the first set is level 23 (10-7-6-6-5). The app's FAQ says your first set reaches 23 at level 43, and that this is the max pull-up score on the U.S. Marine Corps PFT for men aged 21 to 35. Level 53 has 30 on the first set, and the last level, 83, has 50. How you move up and what each level prescribes are in the pull-up program post, and the steps to take when you can't do one yet are in the post for when you can't do a pull-up.

FAQ #

How many pull-ups can the average man do? #

None of the sources found for this post gave an average that represents adult men in general. In the Norwegian conscript selection data, the median for 18,847 men aged 17 to 21 was 7, with the 25th to 75th percentiles at 3 to 10, and the author wrote that the data skew somewhat higher than the general population.

How many pull-ups can the average woman do? #

In the same Norwegian data, the results for 11,927 women stayed on horizontal pull-ups all the way up to the 80th percentile. That means at least eight in ten couldn't do a single hanging pull-up. The 90th percentile was 2 and the 95th was 4. The women's max on the Marine Corps PFT is 4 to 12 pull-ups depending on age, and on the service academies' CFA it's 7.

Is 10 pull-ups good? #

It depends on what you compare it with. In the Norwegian conscript selection data, 10 was the men's 70th percentile. On the Marine Corps PFT men's table, it's 63 points for ages 17 to 20 and 57 for ages 21 to 25, and the max is 18 to 23 depending on age. For women on the Marine Corps table, 10 is 90 points for ages 26 to 30 and 95 for ages 21 to 25 and 31 to 35, and at every other age it's at or above the max. Either way, that only holds for 10 reps counted by that standard's rules.

Can I use the app's count to work out my PFT score? #

Not directly. The app counts reps that cross a judging line a little below the bar and doesn't judge momentum or whether your arms fully straightened, while the Marine Corps PFT requires your chin above the bar and doesn't count kipping reps. To compare, use a count you redo from video filmed from the side.