Syedee Hip Thrust Machine – Budget Friendly But Is It Any Good? 2024 Review

Last updated on April 5th, 2024 at 09:29 am

Hip Thrusts are a staple in our gym. It’s why the Booty Sprout was something we were really excited to add. After over a year of use you get a little itch. Could the grass be greener on the other side? Could a more “dedicated” hip thrust solution be better? That is where the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine enters the gym.

The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine is a dedicated hip thrust unit. No folding, no set up, just getting to work. The Booty Sprout is fantastic, but it trades some stability and size for the mobility and storage aspects. So our primary goals with testing out a dedicated unit were to see if we could manage to get the MAJORITY of the benefits of the Booty Sprout, and minimize the few faults.

Transparency Note

Syedee was kind enough to send me this unit for free. I was pretty excited, until they started doing some really weird stuff in the background. Their initial requests (after sending me the unit) were to publish a full video review within a week or two of receiving the unit. Then when I told them no, I got threatened with the contact person getting fired, going on welfare to feed their child, and more. No, I am not exaggerating. This was an absolutely insane process that I haven’t had happen before. Hopefully what you see in the following isn’t skewed by any of this.

Syedee Hip Thrust Machine Specs

This unit measures just over 55″ long and 23.6″ wide at the widest point. The platform is 23.6″ long, making sure your feet will fit no matter your shoe size. The platform has a diamond pattern texture to provide additional grip for your feet.

The unit is designed to be stored upright, with the included wheels helping to navigate it into and out of storage. The handles have a textured rubber grip on them, along with the front handle to help pick the unit up and steer it.

Included with the unit are 4 band pegs, which can be adjusted. Each side has 4 options for said band pegs. The band pegs can be removed to reduce the width for storage.

The pad is 20″ off the ground. It is a half circle shape, which runs parallel to the floor. It is 8″ deep, and about 2.76″ inches thick.

Set Up Of The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine

I filmed a quick unboxing video, per Syedee’s request, and tossed it on YouTube. Normally I find these less than helpful, but in this case, I think they have some work to do. The unit came with no instructions, just a blown out schematic. And this was the first piece of equipment I have assembled that I did not have the right socket for (I have since expanded my socket selection, but I found this odd in general).

Luckily, there aren’t a ton of pieces so install is fairly straight forward, even without instructions. I think it was weird to finally have a piece that didn’t come with any tools, instructions, or support for installation, as most have all of that. Even the budget AboveGenius Adjustable Bench came with tools and instructions. That said, I’m happy to report that I didn’t have to throw away another random hex wrench. So I’ll call this a mixed feelings experience so far.

Other Options

For those that have followed the Hip Thrust game for awhile, you probably see direct resemblance from this unit to the Sorinex Hip Thruster (no longer in production). This was the original dedicated hip thrust set up created by Bret Contreras. It has a similar frame construction, handle placement, wheels, pad, and more. They clearly looked at this to build their own. No shame here, and there are some differences. But the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine isn’t exactly creating something new.

Booty Sprout Review – 2024

Looking at Bret’s current offers, his Thruster 3.0 which is the flagship model, runs right around $500. This puts it at roughly 2x the cost of the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine. The Booty Sprout is currently listed at $170 AND comes with some bands. Even Bret’s mobile version is about $220. Taking a glance at Amazon, where I first saw the Syedee model, the only other option available right now is the RitFit bench.

So the the Syedee is probably accurately priced in terms of on paper features and brand name. Let’s see how it stacks up.

Small Note on Verbiage

Syedee is obviously an import company making clones of products and selling them as their own. There are no shortage of these companies, and I have both supported and frowned upon said companies in the past.

What I find interesting is reading their product description for the machine. They are littered with odd verbiage choices, inconsistent naming, and even some potentially sexist comments.

• “and is a great supply to other large machines”
  • supplement?
• They call it a hip thrust station, hip thrust machine, hip bridge machine, etc.
• “Taking into account the needs of girls for hip training, We have added the 2 wheels on the back, so girls can easily move it. Also it can be leaned against the wall to save storage space.”
  • Smaller athletes is the correct term here. There are plenty of females out lifting ME!
• the capitalization, even on their own company name, is inconsistent

Just a bad finishing touch on a product page to have these kinds of items included. You could drop a few bucks to have someone review it and provide better language. Hell, I’d do it for free simply because they sent me the machine.

Performance Of The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine

The first thing I noticed was that the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine was missing grip, in two places actually. My garage is half covered in horse stall mats, and half garage floor. The biggest open space is the garage floor, thus I TEND to use machines in that space. Unfortunately, the bottom of the unit is bare metal. This means it slides around, scuffs up the powder coat, and otherwise makes for a less than ideal experience. I ended up pushing it against the flooring frame I have and this worked. This means less options for where it can go, but we got the job done.

The second place is on the foot platform. The diamond pattern is an attempt to provide grip to your feet. Arguably, it does work better than smooth powdercoated metal. BUT, it doesn’t work well enough. Both me and my wife individually commented about how easy it was for our feet to slide around. Toss on some weight and the last thing you want is for your foot to slide out from under you.

To be fair, The Booty Sprout had the same problem. We remedied this with some grip tape like you’d find on a skateboard. So a similar approach would work here.

What sucks is that diamond plating doesn’t work as intended, and will make the grip tape less effective. Plus I assume it cost the company a few bucks. Instead they should have gone with a textured powdercoat, similar to what you see on truck bed liners.

Storage

One issue I found, is that for some reason I wanted to grab the unit with one hand on the rubberized grips. That doesn’t work. One hand at a time and the entire unit tilts and falls over. You can grab the center hand hold and be good, or use two hands and be good. But for whatever reason, time and time again I grab it one handed and then get mad. So, don’t be like me I guess?

Band Pegs

What makes the band pegs great for storage, makes them terrible in use. The fact that they come out to the side and move inwards makes them not very friendly for their intended purposes. Trying to use the Booty Sprout bands and a carabiner is pretty difficult. You can TECHNICALLY make it work, but check the clearance here. The first time my wife did it she scraped her knuckles, and I’ve pinched my fingers a number of times. The bands also don’t sit still well, so you are working with a moving piece throughout the set with wobble and shift happening. Not my favorite sensation during a hard set.

So now you are relegated to using more traditional powerlifting bands. That is fine, we have those, but they aren’t anywhere near as simple as the Booty Sprout bands to use, progress, unhook, etc. Add to that, that again, the band peg is so close to the ground that hooking a band on there of any size can be a pinching hazard. AND again, because the band pegs like to move, you have the constant ability for them to shimmy and shake and slide if you have any loss in tension on the bands.

Deal Breaker

If you read the Booty Sprout review, you know that we don’t do barbell hip thrusts in my garage very often. I don’t find the set up time and hassle worth while. Bands on the other hand, are a big win. In fact, the biggest win of the Booty Sprout was that it was so easy to use that we regularly include Hip Thrusts in our programming. So, having this unit be a little band unfriendly, is a MAJOR negative in our space. I’ll be so blunt as to say, this was a deal breaker in our testing. (If YOU like barbell hip thrusts, by all means keep reading to see if this unit makes sense for you).

Take a look at the other major hip thrust option on the market from Bret Contreras, the Thruster 3.0. You can see while the band pegs come out the side, they have a T formation so you have multiple options in how you hook up whatever bands you decide to use. The Booty Sprout has the band hook on the TOP of the unit, which is fantastic, easy to access, and easy to unhook. Bret’s model will work with the Booty Sprout bands, his own bands, the common strength training elastic bands, and probably anything else you could think of. Another reason why he is the glute dude.

The Pad

The pad on the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine gave us some mixed feelings. On one hand, the Booty Sprout pad and single post consistently gives my wife the fear of being impaled. No, it hasn’t happened, I don’t think it ever well, but she says she can’t shake that feeling. The Syedee pad supports are more robust. Without the folding mechanism, with two posts (one on each side), and everything being bolted together, it is a MUCH more stable and reassuring set-up.

As I demoed on the Booty Sprout, we didn’t have any issues with my 250+lb frame hip thrusting like 405lbs… so my wife’s 150lb frame and hip thrusting 250lbs isn’t a REAL concern. But that feeling of security is real. Win for the dedicated set-up here.

Not Great

On the other hand, the pad itself is pretty shit. You can see that ours is already tearing. This started happening in the first week. The Booty Sprout is a nice rounded pad, much like the BC Strength option. In fact the BC Strength Thurster 3.0 has TWO options. One is static like the Booty Sprout, but with TWO posts instead of one. And the other actually rotates giving you some options depending on your preferred set-up or just the ability to mix things up.

The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine pad is flat with the slight curved top, which isn’t ideal in our experience. It is firm, which is nice, but very lacking in density. The flat nature as a whole means you have the high likelihood of having your back rub against the base of the pad… i.e. on metal. This was what happened to my Get RxD GHD after time. The top pad would shift and you’d have some less than ideal situations. The fully round set up encourages you to set up correctly, and rotate your body around it as you thrust.

How The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine Handle Weight

This is always a big question for these types of unit. The Booty Sprout was one that people were pretty shocked to see that I could toss 405lbs plus my 250lb frame on there and be good. I tried to test run the Syedee for a similar lift, but the set up was pretty bad in our space. Remember, I have to set up the hip thrust machine in the open section of my garage.

To keep the Syedee from sliding, it has to bump up against the frame of the rubber matting. Unfortunately, my additional floor mats don’t stack up well on the side of the Syedee up against the frame, and make for the entire thing to just not jive. I spent close to two hours trying to figure out a solution inside my rack, to the side of my rack, in front of my rack, on the concrete. Nothing worked.

The best I got was about 230lbs plus my 260lb frame. It showed absolutely no struggles there. I don’t doubt that the thing could technically, easily, handle whatever weight you throw at it.

One thing I learned during this test, is that the Syedee bench is ONLY stable when your feet are on the platform. Meaning, when you go to get set up and sit on the pad, the entire thing rocks back a bit. Not enough to fall over, but enough to scare you.

The Big Take Away

The Syedee Hip Thrust Machine is a piece that, if we were living in a world where other options didn’t exist, I’d probably say go for it. But the handful of issues, plus the price, make me want to tell you to look elsewhere. In fact, if this was our only option, I think we would be back to where we were BEFORE the Booty Sprout… consistently skipping Hip Thrusts.

As I noted above a few times, this just did not work well for OUR space. Take a look at this final picture, I can’t even use the band pegs in the one dedicated open floor mat space I have! Now, I’ll be fair here. If you have a fully covered garage floor with open space, you might have better luck than I did. You might even enjoy it. And if using bands is a secondary hip thrust option to barbells for you, then we might be very different use cases.

Better Options

But with the Booty Sprout being CHEAPER, and it comes with some bands, I have a hard time recommending you go with the Syedee in my own personal experience. My wife has gone back to the Booty Sprout entirely, so that should be your sign right there. I think the king of budget at home Hip Thrust set-ups, is The Booty Sprout. If you want an easier way to do Hip Thrusts without dedicating a machine to them, you can check out the Pivot Pad from AbMat.

If you wanted a more dedicated piece, I think you gotta pony up and grab the BC Strength Thruster 3.0. It addresses the pad issues, moves easily, is stable, has proper footing and grip, and band set-up options, all in one. The price hurts at close to 3x the cost of the Booty Sprout, but we are talking the biggest name in glute gains and his premier product offering. You are paying for the features AND the name.

I still haven’t used the Bret Contreras piece myself, so the above is based on my perceptions.

Keep An Eye Out

Another option to look at is the Freak Athlete Nordic Hyper GHD.

Wrap Up of the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine Review

In the end (get it?) I think you should pass on the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine. The Booty Sprout is cheaper and more functional. And if you want MORE than what the Booty Sprout offers, there are better options out there. We will be listing the Syedee Hip Thrust Machine on Marketplace here shortly to make room for more toys, since this won’t be getting any use here.

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