Upper back

What these work on

The upper back is the part that rounds forward over a desk and stays there. These practices open the front of the chest, move the shoulder blades, and rotate the mid back, which is the direction it rarely goes on its own.

One of them is built differently. Bring those shoulders back uses loaded movements rather than holds, and that distinction carries weight: when researchers compare stretching against strengthening for the way the upper spine carries itself, strengthening is the one that changes it, and the effect is largest in exactly this region.

The rest are stretches, and they do what stretching does well. More range through the mid back, and less of that gripped feeling between the shoulder blades.

A few minutes on most days is the shape that works. Change shows up within about four weeks, and it holds above where you started even when life interrupts.