Hip pain is genuinely tricky, because the hip is a busy crossroads — the joint itself, the muscles and tendons around it, the lower back, and the pelvis all refer pain to the same region. So before reaching for a set of exercises, the most useful thing you can do is get a rough sense of what’s hurting. Pain deep in the groin behaves very differently from pain on the side of the hip or in the buttock, and they call for different approaches. The good news is that a great deal of hip pain — particularly the non-arthritic, muscle-and-pelvis kind — responds really well to gentle, targeted exercise, because it’s so often driven by weak or imbalanced support around the joint.
Key takeaway: Hip pain has several possible sources — the joint, the surrounding muscles, the pelvis, or the lower back. Much non-arthritic hip pain responds well to gentle glute and deep-hip strengthening plus mobility work. Groin pain or morning stiffness points more toward the joint itself and is worth getting assessed before you push into exercise.
For most non-arthritic hip pain, the most helpful exercises strengthen the glutes and deep hip muscles that stabilise the joint — glute bridges, clams, and side-lying leg lifts — combined with gentle mobility such as knee-to-chest and a figure-four stretch. Build gradually and stop anything that sharply increases pain. Because hip pain has several causes, matching the work to the cause matters. Sophie Mercer, PMA-certified clinical Pilates instructor, targets the muscles and pelvic stability behind common hip and buttock pain in her 8-week SI Joint Pain protocol of 32 exercises.
How do you know if it’s muscle or joint?
This is the first thing worth sorting out, because it changes everything.
Muscle and soft-tissue pain tends to sit on the side of the hip or in the buttock, flares with particular movements (climbing stairs, lying on that side, getting up from a chair), and often eases a little with gentle movement and stretching. It’s commonly driven by weak or overworked muscles around the hip and pelvis.
True hip-joint pain is more often felt in the groin or deep in the front of the hip, can be stiff first thing in the morning, and tends to worsen with weight-bearing and at the ends of your range. This is the pattern more associated with the joint itself, including arthritis.
If your pain is deep in the groin, comes with significant stiffness, or you’re limping, it’s worth getting it assessed before loading it. For the muscular and pelvic kind, targeted exercise is usually exactly what’s needed.
The best exercises to start with
For common muscular and pelvic hip pain, the priority is stability — strengthening the muscles that support and control the hip:
- Glute bridges: lying on your back, lift your hips by squeezing your glutes. This builds the primary support for the hip and pelvis.
- Clams: lying on your side with knees bent, open the top knee while keeping your feet together. This targets the deep gluteal muscles that stabilise the hip.
- Side-lying leg lifts: lift the top leg with control to strengthen the gluteus medius on the side of the hip.
Add gentle mobility — knee-to-chest and a figure-four stretch (ankle over opposite knee, drawing the thigh in) — to ease tension around the joint. Start gently, keep it pain-free, and build over weeks.
Will it go away with exercise?
For a lot of people, yes — meaningfully so. When hip pain comes from weak or imbalanced muscles around the joint and pelvis, strengthening that support directly addresses the cause, and the pain often settles as stability improves. Even with arthritic or structural changes, appropriate exercise that supports and mobilises the joint usually reduces pain and improves function, even if it can’t reverse the underlying change. The key word throughout is appropriate — matched to your cause and built up gradually.
The hip, pelvis, and back are one system
Here’s why a piecemeal approach so often disappoints: the hip rarely hurts in isolation. The sacroiliac joints of the pelvis, the deep hip rotators, the glutes, and the lower back all share the load, and a weakness or restriction in one shows up as pain in another. SI joint dysfunction in particular frequently presents as hip and buttock pain. That’s why I address the whole region — building balanced strength and stability across the pelvis and hip together — rather than chasing the single spot that hurts.
How the SI Joint Pain protocol helps
Sophie’s 8-Week SI Joint Pain Program targets exactly the pelvic and deep-hip stability that drives so much hip and buttock pain — gentle release first, then progressive strengthening — across 32 structured exercises. If your hip pain stems from the muscles and pelvis rather than the joint surface itself, this is the kind of work that resolves it.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Hip pain has many possible causes; if your pain is severe, deep in the groin, accompanied by significant stiffness, or you’re limping, please consult a physiotherapist or doctor before starting exercises.