The median best-ever competition bench press for men is 303 lb — among 220,366 male raw powerlifters aged 20–45, at all bodyweights. The 25th percentile is 259 lb and the 90th is 408 lb.
| Percentile | Lift |
|---|---|
| 5th | 198 lb (90 kg) |
| 10th | 220 lb (100 kg) |
| 25th | 259 lb (118 kg) |
| 50th (median) | 303 lb (138 kg) |
| 75th | 353 lb (160 kg) |
| 90th | 408 lb (185 kg) |
| 95th | 441 lb (200 kg) |
Source: OpenPowerlifting database, build 2026-07-25-606a59af (public domain). Percentiles computed by Motus. Method.
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Everyone in this table entered a judged powerlifting meet. They are not a sample of gym-goers and they are not a sample of the general population. People who compete in powerlifting have self-selected for being strong, have usually trained specifically for a one-rep max, and lift under competition commands — which is typically harder than the same lift performed in a gym.
If you have never competed, your comparison point is not the 50th percentile here. A more honest reading: this tells you what strong, specifically-trained men at your bodyweight actually do.
We publish no figure for the average man in the general population, because no comparable dataset of measured one-rep maxes among non-competitors exists. Numbers of that kind circulating online generally come from user-submitted app data, from estimated rather than measured maxes, or from tables with no stated sample. Full method and limitations.
Bodyweight is the single biggest driver of absolute strength, so the all-bodyweight table above is a blunt comparison. These are the same numbers computed within ±5 lb of each bodyweight:
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