Gluteal Muscles (Glutes)

What are your gluteal muscles (glutes)?

Your gluteal muscles (your “glutes”) are your butt muscles. They include your gluteus maximus, gluteus medius and gluteus minimus — in other words, your big one, your medium one and your small one.

Your glutes are at the seat of your muscular “core,” and some of the biggest, heaviest muscles in your body. Strong glute muscles help to stabilize your pelvis and support your body weight when you move.

What do your glute muscles do?

Your glute muscles support your pelvis, which is the seat of your axial skeleton. So, they play a big part in moving your body weight. Your glutes help you sit down, stand up, walk, climb stairs, run and jump.

During movement, your glutes also help stabilize your hip joints. They keep your pelvis from tilting when you put weight on one leg or the other. They hold your hips in their sockets when your thighs move.

What is the function of the gluteus maximus muscle?

Your gluteus maximus is the biggest and strongest muscle in your body. You use it when you need force to move forward, like to stand up, walk, run or climb. These movements require extending your thigh bone.

When you sit, your gluteus maximus acts against gravity, keeping your hips balanced and your trunk upright. With your other gluteal muscles, it also helps support your trunk when you stand on one leg.

What is the function of the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus muscles?

Your gluteus medius and gluteus minimus work together to abduct your thigh (move it away from your trunk) and to rotate it inward and outward. They also stabilize your hips and pelvis when you walk.

Where are your glutes located?

Your gluteal region (your butt) lies behind your pelvis, where your spine meets your legs. Your glutes attach to and overlie your pelvic bones, especially your ilium (the broad, concave bone on each side).

Your glutes aren’t the only muscles in your buttocks, but they’re the biggest and closest to the surface. They make up the shape of your butt and do the bulk of its work. Smaller, deeper muscles also assist.

Where is your gluteus maximus located?

Your gluteus maximus is the big muscle inside each butt cheek, close to the surface. It starts from several points on your pelvis and wraps around your backside, attaching to your femur (thigh bone).

Your gluteus maximus covers part of your gluteus medius, your deep lateral hip rotators and the start of your hamstrings. If you put your hand on your butt while stepping up, you’ll feel it contract.

What other body parts does your gluteus maximus work with?

Your gluteus maximus connects with other soft tissues to form your posterior oblique sling. Anatomy slings (muscle slings or myofascial slings) are networks of tissues that work together when you move.

Your posterior sling starts from your back muscles (latissimus dorsi) and travels across your buttocks to your opposite hip, passing through your thoracolumbar fascia. It works to stabilize your pelvis and trunk.

Where are your gluteus medius and gluteus minimus located?

Your gluteus medius is a broad, fan-shaped muscle that lies between your gluteus maximus and gluteus minimus. It covers the surface of your ilium, spans your hip and attaches to the top of your thigh bone.

The back part of the muscle lies under your gluteus maximus. The front part lies under the deep fascia of your hip. Gluteus medius covers your gluteus minimus — a smaller, fan-shaped muscle that lies beneath.

What other parts do your gluteus medius and gluteus minimus work with?

Your gluteus medius and minimus are part of your lateral sling, which works to stabilize, balance, rotate and abduct your hips. Your lateral sling starts from your hip and travels down your thigh to your knee.

It starts with a small, superficial hip muscle called your tensor fascia lata and ends with your iliotibial band. One nerve — your superior gluteal nerve — activates all three of the muscles in your lateral sling.

What health conditions or disorders can affect your gluteal muscles (glutes)?

Common conditions involving your glutes include:

Gluteal nerve injury

Injury to your superior gluteal nerve — which activates the muscles in your lateral sling — could weaken or paralyze these muscles. This would impede certain movements, like abducting and rotating your hip.

It would also prevent these muscles from stabilizing your pelvis when you walk. This leads to a common gait disorder called Trendelenburg gait, in which your pelvis drops to each side when you take a step.

Common causes include:

• Hip dislocation or hip fracture
• Hip surgery, such as hip replacement surgery
• Misplaced intramuscular injection
• Nerve entrapment or compression syndromes

Less commonly, these same causes could injure your inferior gluteal nerve, which activates your gluteus maximus muscle. Weakness or paralysis of this muscle would make it hard to stand up or climb stairs.

Glute muscle weakness and inhibition

Your gluteus maximus is passive except during certain forceful movements, like standing up, running and climbing. If you sit on it a lot and don’t activate it much, it becomes weaker and slower to activate.

Pain or tightness in other tissues may also inhibit your glutes or prevent them from activating properly. This leads to muscle imbalances, weakening your glutes while overloading other muscles and tissues.

Healthcare providers have linked weakened glute muscles to various pain syndromes, including:

• Dead butt syndrome
• Hamstring strain
• Lower back pain

By overburdening other tissues, weak glutes can also contribute to overuse injuries, including:

• Gluteal tendinopathy
• Trochanteric bursitis

What can I do to take care of my glutes?

Movement is crucial to the health of your musculoskeletal system, and your glutes are no exception. Healthy, regular movement is the best preventive medicine against musculoskeletal pain of all kinds.

If your occupation requires a lot of sitting, you’ll need to take steps (literally!) to ward off the damage it can do — including dead butt syndrome. Frequent breaks and a more ergonomic workstation can help.

Specific exercises may also have a place in preventing and treating glute issues. For example, exercises that build a strong core can help reinforce your lateral and posterior slings, including your glutes.

If you already have glute issues, you might want to consult a physical therapist. They can prescribe specific exercises for your condition. You can also consult an athletic trainer about glute exercises.