Muscle-Building for Skinny Guys

Animation of a skinny guy bulking up, building muscle, and becoming muscular.

Illustration of a skinny ectomorph building muscle

We Help Hardgainers, Skinny & Skinny-Fat Guys Bulk Up

For the past 12 years, we've specialized in helping skinny guys build muscle, get strong, and gain weight. People say it's a small niche, but if this bulk goes according to plan, we'll soon be the biggest community on the internet.

I'm Shane Duquette, and I gained 55 pounds in a little over two years. I was lucky. I had the help of my business partner, Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS, PN, a naturally thin strength coach who'd already gained 60 pounds. We also helped our other business partner, Jared Polowick, gain 50 pounds.

Before and after photos showing Shane Duquette's ectomorph muscle-building transformation

Before and after photos showing Marco Walker-Ng building muscle as a skinny ectomorph.

Before and after photo of a skinny guy bulking up and gaining muscle

We're the founders of Bony to Beastly (for skinny men), Bony to Bombshell (for skinny women), and Outlift. We've helped over 10,000 skinny people build muscle, with clients ranging from college students to senior citizens, MDs to PhDs, and office workers all way the way up to college, professional, and Olympic athletes.

Before and after photos showing a skinny fat transformation.

Before and after photos showing the results from doing the Bony to Beastly Program

Before and after photo of a skinny guy leanly building muscle and bulking up in one year

Before and after photo of a skinny guy bulking up his shoulders and becoming muscular

The proof is in the smoothie, too. We consistently get the best bulking transformations on the internet. Check out these muscle-building transformations from guys doing the Bony to Beastly Program.

Bigger, Stronger, & Fitter

Bony guys are defined by their scaffolding. We're here to help you fill out that frame with muscle, reaping all the long-term health and fitness benefits as you bulk up.

Maybe you're a "hardgainer," where no matter how much you eat, you can't gain weight. You aren't crazy. There's genetic variation in stomach size, appetite, and metabolism. Many of us are genetically predisposed to thinness. We need to find a diet that suits us.
Maybe you're an "ectomorph," with thinner wrists and narrower shoulders, worried your frame can't support muscle growth. We had that same fear. It isn't true. Thin guys tend to be able to build muscle faster than other body types.
Maybe you're skinny-fat, getting bigger and smaller without ever getting leaner or stronger. That's frustrating. You're one of the rare few who eats the right amount of food, yet it's being stored as fat instead of muscle. We need to reverse that, and we can.

We're the Costco of muscle. You can find anything you want, but everything is in bulk. We write about how to eat a healthy weight-gain diet, how to train for muscle size, and how to live a lifestyle that supports muscle, strength, and overall fitness.

If you want us to walk you through the entire process of bulking up, check out our Bony to Beastly Program. We'll teach you everything you need to know, including diet, training, and lifestyle. We'll answer all your questions, give you feedback along the way, and support you through every step of the process. Your results are fully guaranteed.

We've also written hundreds of free articles about how to build muscle, eat a good diet, and live a healthy lifestyle. Feel free to drop a comment. I answer all of them.

Thin Genetics

Thin guys often have different genetics, giving us different struggles and goals and influencing how we eat, lift, and live.

The Art of Bulking

The only way to get bigger is to gain weight. The best way to gain weight is to prioritize muscle growth—to bulk. Nobody knows bulking better than we do.

How to Train Your Muscles

One of the best ways to improve your results is to improve your training. The more muscle growth you can stimulate, the more calories your muscles will gobble up, leaving fewer to store as body fat. We'll show you how to stimulate more growth.

Plus, you may want to develop a certain muscle. Perhaps you're tired of having a thin neck, lanky arms, or a small chest. The best way to develop a specific muscle is to train it. We'll show you how.

How to Eat a Good Diet

It isn't hard to learn about how to eat a nutritious diet. However, most of that advice is for overweight people struggling to lose weight. We have the opposite problem. We need an abundant diet that's rich in calories and nutrients, supporting our health and muscle growth.

How to Build Muscle at Home

Gyms are great, but you can build just as much muscle at home. I've bulked with adjustable dumbbells in my small apartment. Now I lift weights in my barbell home gym. In a pinch, you can even bulk with bodyweight workouts. You can use whatever you have, but be smart about it.

How to Improve Your Appearance

I know, I know. We're supposed to work out to develop our inner beauty and fortitude. But it doesn't hurt to look great while we do it. Most of the advice on the internet is either politically correct or distorted by the manosphere. That's why we've consulted with the top attractiveness researchers and conducted our own surveys.

How to Get Leaner, Fitter & Healthier

All of our articles consider health and fitness. We're not in the bodybuilding or powerlifting scene. We're part of the fitness industry. We're natural lifters who want to be strong, fit, and healthy. Still, there are two things naturally thin guys need to know:

Muscle-Building Supplements

Supplements are overrated but helpful. We don't sell supplements or use any affiliate links, keeping our supplement recommendations as unbiased as possible.

Kick back, relax, and enjoy some moderately heavy reading. We'll teach you everything you need to know to go from lean to mean, from stick to thick, from Bony to Beastly.

Our Recent Articles

Before and After Illustration of man building a thicker and more muscular neck.

How to Build a Thicker Neck (Even if It’s Skinny)

I always hated how skinny my neck was. When I was at my skinniest, my neck circumference was 14 inches. After bulking up and gaining 60 pounds, it grew to 14.25 inches. Clearly, the compound lifts I was doing weren’t developing my neck muscles. That’s where neck training comes in.…

Illustration of a skinny fat guy working out and dieting to build muscle, lose fat, and achieve body recomposition.

The Skinny Fat Workout & Diet Guide

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Nov 22, 2023

Skinny fat is when you’re overfat but undermuscled, giving you a normal BMI but an unhealthy body composition. It’s when you’re not quite fat but not quite skinny, either. The good news is you aren’t overeating or undereating, so you won’t need to force yourself to eat more food (bulking)…

Illustration comparing a skinny, skinny fat, and overweight man.

What is the Skinny Fat Body Type? Not Skinny But Not Fat

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Nov 16, 2023

“Skinny fat” is the casual term for someone with normal-weight obesity, also known as Metabolically Obese Normal Weight (MONW). It’s when you aren’t quite skinny but aren’t quite fat, either. More specifically, it’s an abundance of visceral fat combined with a paucity of muscle mass, both of which can cause…

Illustration of a skinny guy learning how to bulk up and build muscle.

How to Bulk: the Complete Beginner Guide

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Nov 2, 2023

Bulking is often derided as the fool’s way of building muscle. That’s true on average. Most people are already overweight. The last thing they need is more weight. But if you’re thin, underweight, or lean, bulking is by far the best way to build muscle. In this guide, we’ll teach…

Illustration of a skinny guy trying to bulk up by eating fast food.

The Best Fast Food Restaurants for Bulking

By Shane Duquette and Cassandra Duquette | Nov 1, 2023

We get this question a fair bit. You want to get a healthy, high-calorie bulking meal from a fast-food restaurant. You can. You’ve got a few great choices.

Illustration of a skinny old man bulking up and becoming muscular.

How Age Affects Muscle Growth

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Oct 30, 2023

We’ve helped 15,000 skinny people bulk up, ranging from 18 to 80 years old. Marco has coached college, professional, and Olympic athletes revelling in the peak of their athletic performance. He’s also coached sedentary desk workers in their 20s, 40s, 60s, and 80s. What we’ve seen matches what we see…

Illustration of two skinny guys confused about how many workouts to do per week.

How Often Should You Lift Weights to Build Muscle?

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Oct 16, 2023

Most guys assume that training more often stimulates more muscle growth. If that were true, then to build muscle faster, you’d train as often as possible—maybe as many as 5 or even 6 days per week. To do any less would be to miss out on muscle gains. That’s the…

Illustration of a bodybuilder pouring a high-calorie bulking smoothie into a glass.

How to Make High-Calorie Bulking Smoothies (to Gain Weight)

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Sep 23, 2023

A good bulking smoothie makes it easier to get into a calorie surplus, allowing you to gain weight and thus build muscle. We’ve used these smoothies to gain nearly 70 pounds each. We’ve also used them with thousands of clients, ranging from everyday people all the way up to Olympic…

Illustration of a skinny guy worried that he's having too much whey protein powder.

How Much Protein Powder Can You Have Per Day?

By Shane Duquette and Marco Walker-Ng, BHSc, PTS | Sep 21, 2023

One of the most common questions we get is how much protein powder is too much protein powder? One scoop of whey per day is probably fine, right? But what about 2 scoops? 3 scoops? 4? I’ve seen dozens of muscle-building studies where the researchers give participants upwards of 60…

If none of these articles tickle your fancy, we've got dozens more.

Or if you're ready to start building muscle, check out our bulking program.