Part of the data ring
WHITELIGHTS

Real judged lifts. Zero self-reported numbers. This is what strong actually is.

Verdict

Is a 135 lb squat good?

For a man at 82.5–87.5 kg it is below the 1st percentile of 20,457 judged lifts — novice. At other bodyweights the answer changes, and the table below gives all of them.

The short answer

At 82.5–87.5 kg bodyweight, 135 lb is the 1st percentile of judged lifts — novice among people who compete.

Intermediate Advanced Elite World-class 0255075100 80110140170200230260 kg lifted →
kg

Percentile

20,457 judged squats, men, 82.5–87.5 kg

No lift entered. The curve is every judged squats in this class — add yours to it.

SOURCE·Judged competition results (OpenPowerlifting)·20,457 judged squats, men, 82.5–87.5 kg·REVIEWED JUL 2026

Not your class?

135 lb is 61 kg. The chart is preloaded with it — change the number to check your own.

From 1.8 million judged lifts to one percentile

  1. Take only judged lifts. Every row is an attempt performed on a competition platform in front of three referees. Anything from a phone, a survey or a training log is not in the archive at all.
  2. Drop equipped lifts. Raw only — no squat suits, no bench shirts. A suit is worth tens of kilos and would silently inflate every figure on the page.
  3. Count each lifter once, at their best. Somebody who competes twenty times is one data point, not twenty, so the curve is a population of people rather than a population of meets.
  4. Split by sex and 5 kg bodyweight class, then by age band. A lift is a different achievement at 60 kg and at 120 kg, so a single national average would be an average of two different questions.
  5. Sort the class and read off the 99 cut points. Your percentile is the position of your lift in that sorted list — not a score, a rank against named people.
  6. Publish nothing thin. A slice with fewer than 500 lifters is not given a page: its tails would be noise dressed as a standard.
percentile(x)  =  100 × count(best_raw ≤ x) ÷ n

  class   =   sex  ×  5 kg bodyweight bucket  [ ×  age band ]
  n       =   lifters in that class, each counted once, at their best
  x       =   your lift, in kilograms

  band    =   01–19  novice        50–79  advanced      95–99  world class
              20–49  intermediate  80–94  elite

The full method, including what is excluded and why →

What 135 lb means at every bodyweight

The same lift is a different achievement at 60 kg and at 120 kg. This is the whole answer, not one row of it.

Men

BodyweightPercentileBandMedian for the class
up to 52.5 kg 34th Intermediate 72.5
52.5–57.5 kg 6th Novice 106.6
57.5–62.5 kg 2nd Novice 127.5
62.5–67.5 kg <1 Novice 150.0
67.5–72.5 kg <1 Novice 152.5
72.5–77.5 kg <1 Novice 170.0
77.5–82.5 kg <1 Novice 182.5
82.5–87.5 kg <1 Novice 185.0
87.5–92.5 kg <1 Novice 197.5
92.5–97.5 kg <1 Novice 200.0
97.5–102.5 kg <1 Novice 210.0
102.5–107.5 kg <1 Novice 217.5
107.5–112.5 kg <1 Novice 217.5
112.5–117.5 kg <1 Novice 222.5
117.5–122.5 kg <1 Novice 235.0
122.5–127.5 kg <1 Novice 229.1
127.5–132.5 kg <1 Novice 230.0
132.5–137.5 kg <1 Novice 240.0
137.5 kg and above <1 Novice 245.0

Women

BodyweightPercentileBandMedian for the class
up to 52.5 kg 19th Novice 82.5
52.5–57.5 kg 7th Novice 95.0
57.5–62.5 kg 4th Novice 100.0
62.5–67.5 kg 3rd Novice 107.5
67.5–72.5 kg 3rd Novice 111.0
72.5–77.5 kg 2nd Novice 117.5
77.5–82.5 kg 2nd Novice 117.5
82.5–87.5 kg 3rd Novice 120.0
87.5–92.5 kg 3rd Novice 120.0
92.5–97.5 kg 3rd Novice 120.0
97.5–102.5 kg 2nd Novice 127.5
102.5–107.5 kg 2nd Novice 127.5
107.5–112.5 kg 2nd Novice 130.0
112.5–117.5 kg 3rd Novice 132.5
117.5–122.5 kg 2nd Novice 137.5
122.5–127.5 kg 2nd Novice 142.0
137.5 kg and above 2nd Novice 142.5

SOURCE·Judged competition results (OpenPowerlifting)·135 lb scored against every published squat class·REVIEWED JUL 2026

The road from here

LiftPercentileBand
61.21stNovice
71.21stNovice
81.21stNovice
91.22ndNovice

Men at 82.5–87.5 kg bodyweight. Percentile gained per 10 kg, so you can see what the next plate is actually worth.

SOURCE·Judged competition results (OpenPowerlifting)·20,457 judged squats, men 82.5–87.5 kg·REVIEWED JUL 2026

Is a 135 lb squat good? — the short answers

Is a 135 lb squat good?

For a man weighing 82.5–87.5 kg, 135 lb (61 kg) is below the 1st percentile of 20,457 judged competition squats, which this site labels novice. Everyone in that comparison entered a powerlifting meet, so they are stronger than the general gym population.

Does bodyweight change the answer?

Substantially. The same 135 lb is the 34th percentile for men at up to 52.5 kg and below the 1st percentile for men at 137.5 kg and above. The table above gives every published class for both sexes.

What would take a 135 lb squat into the top fifth?

At 82.5–87.5 kg the 80th percentile — the cut-off this site calls elite — is 215 kg (474 lb). That is 154 kg more than 135 lb.

Who these numbers describe. Everyone in this dataset entered a powerlifting competition. They are stronger than the general gym population, so a 50th percentile here is well above an average gym-goer — we would rather tell you that than quietly flatter you. Nobody has ever published a trustworthy random sample of what people lift in commercial gyms; what exists instead is app data that people type in themselves.

See all 10 sites in this family, with what each one answers

Published by

Amit Sharma

Auckland real-estate agent and marketer. Builds free, sourced data tools.