You don’t need to push your muscles to absolute exhaustion to grow them—working them pretty hard (but not all the way to failure) might give you just as much muscle growth as going all out.

If you lift weights and push your muscles closer to total exhaustion, you’ll likely gain more muscle size than if you stop earlier — even when doing the same number of sets and reps.

Lifting weights close to failure helps build more muscle the closer you get, but it doesn’t seem to matter as much for getting stronger—so the best way to grow muscles might not be the best way to get stronger.

Lifting weights until you can't do another rep doesn't help you build more muscle than stopping before you hit total exhaustion—so you don't need to push yourself to the absolute limit to get the best results.

You can still build muscle even if you don't push your sets to within five reps of total failure, which goes against the idea that only the last few tough reps really matter for growth.

If you lift weights until you're almost too tired to do another rep, you'll likely build bigger muscles—but your strength gains won't be any better than if you stopped earlier, as long as you're doing the same total amount of work and lifting the same weight.