Interactive 3D body — the leg
Rotate a 3D anatomical model of the leg, peel back the layers, and tap a muscle to see where it attaches, what it does, and watch it perform its action. This page lists every muscle in the model; the interactive 3D above is an enhancement for capable devices.
#The leg muscles
- Rectus femoris — the straight middle quad on the front of your thigh — the only one of the four that also crosses the hip (full page)
- Vastus medialis — inner-thigh quad (the teardrop bulge just above and inside your kneecap) (full page)
- Vastus lateralis — outer-thigh quad (the big muscle on the outside of your thigh) (full page)
- Vastus intermedius — the deep middle quad — the part of the front-thigh muscle that lies underneath, buried between the inner and outer quads (full page)
- Biceps femoris — the outer hamstring (the lateral of the two big muscles at the back of your thigh) (full page)
- Semitendinosus — one of the three hamstring muscles at the back of the thigh — the long inner-back one whose cord-like tendon you can feel behind the inner side of your knee (full page)
- Semimembranosus — inner hamstring (deep muscle on the back-inner side of your thigh) (full page)
- Gluteus maximus — the main buttock muscle (the big muscle you sit on) (full page)
- Gluteus medius — side-hip muscle (the fan-shaped muscle on the upper-outer side of your buttock) (full page)
- Gluteus minimus — deepest, smallest buttock muscle (sits under the gluteus medius on the side of your hip) (full page)
- Gastrocnemius — calf muscle (the two-headed bulge on the back of your lower leg) (full page)
- Soleus — the deep calf muscle (the flat one underneath the bulging calf muscle) (full page)