For glute growth
For glute growth, deficit reverse lunge and Smith machine hip thrust score the same.
Deficit reverse lunge gives more stretch; Smith machine hip thrust keeps more of the work on the glutes.
Both are good choices, and they train the glutes differently. Using both across your week covers more of the muscle than either alone: in studies, varied exercises grew parts of a muscle that one exercise missed. (Fonseca et al., 2014; Costa et al., 2021)
The research score comes from these, scored by hand from the studies. Lifter scores appear once an exercise has 10 ratings. How scores work
Deficit Reverse Lunge. The deficit lets you sink lower, stretching the glute of the front leg under load.
Smith Machine Hip Thrust. A hip thrust on rails: stable and simple to load, with the glutes working mostly at the top.
For glute growth, deficit reverse lunge and Smith machine hip thrust score the same. Deficit reverse lunge gives more stretch; Smith machine hip thrust keeps more of the work on the glutes. Both are good choices, and they train the glutes differently. Using both across your week covers more of the muscle than either alone: in studies, varied exercises grew parts of a muscle that one exercise missed.
About the same: both are easy to learn.
Deficit reverse lunge needs dumbbells and a weight plate, so a home gym covers it. Smith machine hip thrust needs a Smith machine and a bench, so for most people it’s a gym exercise.
Smith machine hip thrust: it rates Excellent for joint and recovery cost in our research rubric, against Strong for deficit reverse lunge.