What Is the Side of Your Butt Called?

The side of your butt is formally called the lateral gluteal region, and the muscles that live there are the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus. Most people know the gluteus maximus as the big, powerful muscle that forms the rounded shape of the buttocks, but it’s the pair of muscles tucked along the outer edge that quietly do some of the most important work in your lower body. This area comes up in everything from diagnosing hip pain to understanding “hip dips” to preventing falls as you age, which makes it worth knowing by name.

Anatomy of the Lateral Gluteal Region

When anatomists and clinicians talk about the side of the buttock, they break things down by layers. On the surface is the gluteal aponeurotic fascia, a broad sheet of tough fibrous tissue that wraps around the hip and connects to the iliotibial band running down the outside of your thigh.¹ Beneath that fascial layer sits the gluteus medius, a fan-shaped muscle that attaches to the outer surface of the pelvis and angles down to the bony bump on the side of the upper thigh bone called the greater trochanter. Deeper still, tucked underneath the gluteus medius, is the smaller gluteus minimus. Together these two muscles form the meaty lateral wall of the buttock.

There’s a third muscle worth knowing about in this neighborhood: the tensor fasciae latae, or TFL, which sits at the very front edge of the lateral hip. It blends into the iliotibial band and works alongside the gluteus medius and minimus. The functional relationship between the TFL and the upper fibers of the gluteus maximus is close enough that researchers study the strength ratio between them as a potential early indicator of hip joint problems.²

The greater trochanter itself is worth a mention because it’s the bony landmark people can actually feel. If you press your hand against the side of your hip and rotate your leg, the hard knob you feel under the skin is the greater trochanter. The gluteus medius and minimus tendons attach here, and this spot is ground zero for one of the most common sources of lateral hip pain.

What the Side Glutes Actually Do

The gluteus medius is the primary hip abductor, meaning it pulls your leg out to the side. But its more important everyday job is stabilization. Every time you take a step, you briefly stand on one leg. During that split second, the gluteus medius on the standing-leg side fires to keep your pelvis from dropping on the opposite side. Without that stabilization, walking would involve a dramatic hip-swaying lurch with every step. The gluteus medius, with its three distinct portions, is responsible for stabilizing the hip joint during the initial phase of the walking cycle and initiating pelvic rotation.³

Adequate function of the hip abductor mechanism is integral to healthy lower-limb mechanics.⁴ When clinicians assess this, they often watch how well you can maintain hip-and-pelvis alignment during single-leg tasks like standing on one foot or doing a small squat. A weak gluteus medius lets the pelvis tilt, the knee cave inward, and the ankle compensate awkwardly, setting off a chain of strain from hip to foot. Runners, in particular, tend to discover the importance of these muscles when knee pain, IT band syndrome, or shin splints trace back to poor lateral hip control.

Why Humans Have Unusually Prominent Side Glutes

If you’ve ever noticed that a dog or a cat doesn’t seem to have much of a “side butt,” you’re observing a real anatomical difference. In four-legged animals like cats, dogs, and horses, the gluteal muscles primarily drive hip extension, pushing the hind limb backward to propel the animal forward during walking.⁵ In humans, the gluteus medius shifted its primary role from inward rotation of the thigh to abduction, and this change appears to have been driven by the transition from walking on four legs to walking on two.⁶

What’s interesting is that the muscle itself didn’t need dramatic reshaping to take on this new function. Research suggests that the change in the geometric relationship between the muscle’s pull direction and the orientation of the thigh bone was enough. The behavior of walking upright came first; the bony remodeling of the pelvis followed later. In other words, the gluteus medius was already capable of stabilizing bipedal walking before the human pelvis fully evolved its modern, wide shape. That versatility is why the side of the human buttock is more developed and more functionally distinct than in most other mammals.

Lateral Hip Pain and the Side of the Buttock

For years, pain on the side of the hip was routinely diagnosed as “trochanteric bursitis,” on the assumption that a small fluid-filled sac near the greater trochanter was inflamed. That diagnosis is falling out of favor. The current understanding is that tendinopathy of the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus tendons is the primary local source of lateral hip pain, a condition now more commonly referred to as greater trochanteric pain syndrome.⁷ The condition is particularly common in middle-aged women and postmenopausal women, though it also shows up in athletes and sedentary people alike.⁸

The hallmark of gluteal tendinopathy is pain right over the bony prominence on the side of the hip, typically worsened by lying on the affected side at night or by activities that load the tendons in a compressed position, like crossing your legs or standing with your weight shifted to one hip. It can be genuinely debilitating, interfering with sleep and basic weight-bearing tasks. If you’ve been told you have “bursitis” on the side of your hip and cortisone injections haven’t solved it, the actual problem may be the tendon rather than the bursa.

Diagnosing pain in the buttock region is notoriously tricky in general, because so many structures share overlapping nerve supply and referred-pain patterns.⁹ Pain from the sacroiliac joint, for instance, typically presents as buttock pain but can also radiate into the groin, lower back, or down the leg. In one study, nearly all patients with confirmed sacroiliac joint problems reported buttock pain, half reported associated leg pain, and about a quarter had pain below the knee.¹⁰ The takeaway is that pain “on the side of the butt” could originate from the lateral gluteal tendons, from deeper structures like the sacroiliac joint or piriformis, or from nerve entrapment syndromes sometimes grouped under the term “deep gluteal syndrome.”

Gluteal Amnesia and the Sedentary Side Glute

The term “gluteal amnesia” has gone somewhat viral in fitness circles, and while it sounds dramatic, it refers to a real clinical concern: impaired neuromuscular activation of the gluteal muscles, especially among people who sit for long periods. The idea is that hours of daily sitting can cause the brain-to-muscle signaling for the glutes to become sluggish, leaving them underactive even when you stand up and try to use them. This impaired activation contributes to low back pain and disability, and it appears to be a growing concern among sedentary women in particular.² The practical issue is that when the side glutes don’t fire properly, other muscles compensate, often the TFL or the lower back muscles, and those compensations eventually create pain and dysfunction.

You can’t literally forget how to use a muscle, of course. The real phenomenon is that neural drive decreases and the muscle’s timing gets out of sync with the movements that need it. The fix is targeted activation work, which is why physical therapists often prescribe specific gluteus medius exercises before progressing to more demanding movements.

Best Exercises for the Side Glutes

Not all glute exercises are created equal when it comes to the lateral muscles. Squats and deadlifts are excellent for the gluteus maximus, but they don’t necessarily light up the gluteus medius to the same degree. Electromyography studies that measure muscle activation during various exercises have identified a clear hierarchy for the side glutes.

For the gluteus medius specifically, the exercises producing the highest activation include side-plank hip abduction (with the working leg on the bottom), single-limb squats, advanced clamshell variations, and front planks with hip extension. Side-plank abduction generated over 100% of maximum voluntary contraction in one study, making it the single most demanding gluteus medius exercise measured.¹¹

An important nuance is that some exercises that activate the gluteus medius also heavily recruit the TFL, which isn’t always desirable, especially for people rehabbing hip pain. Research using fine-wire electrodes inserted directly into the muscles found that clams, side-stepping, single-leg bridges, and quadruped hip extensions all activated the gluteal muscles significantly more than the TFL. The clam exercise had the highest ratio of gluteal-to-TFL activation, making it particularly useful for isolating the side glutes without overworking the TFL.¹² Rehabilitation programs generally progress from low-demand exercises to high-demand ones, following a continuum that ramps up gluteus medius activation without aggravating the hip joint or surrounding tendons.¹³

What “Hip Dips” Are and Why They Appear

One of the most common cosmetic concerns related to the side of the buttock goes by the name “hip dips,” the visible inward curve between the hip bone and the upper thigh. The formal term in anatomy is a trochanteric depression. This indentation is primarily determined by skeletal structure: the width of the iliac crest, the angle of the femoral neck, and the distance between the pelvis and the greater trochanter. People with a larger gap between their pelvis and thigh bone tend to have a more pronounced dip because there’s less soft tissue bridging the space.

Hip dips are normal anatomical variation, not a sign of weakness or poor fitness. Building up the gluteus medius can fill out the area slightly, since the muscle sits right over the depression, but the underlying bone geometry sets a floor on how much change exercise alone can produce. For people seeking a more dramatic change, cosmetic practitioners have begun using dermal fillers in this area. One technique involves injecting hyaluronic acid into the intermediate subcutaneous layer over the lateral depression, guided by ultrasound. This layer is considered safe because it sits above the deeper muscular and submuscular zones where larger nerves and blood vessels run.¹⁴ The procedure is still relatively new and carries the risks that come with any injectable filler, but it reflects how much aesthetic attention the lateral gluteal region receives.

Fat Distribution on the Side of the Butt

Where your body stores fat around the buttocks and hips is not just a cosmetic matter. Women tend to carry more fat in the gluteal-femoral region than men do, producing the “pear-shaped” distribution that is associated with lower cardiovascular and metabolic risk compared to the abdominal fat accumulation more typical in men. Research suggests that gluteal-femoral fat may act as a relatively safe storage depot for excess energy, and it may also play an active role in regulating systemic metabolism through the release of hormones and signaling molecules.¹⁵

This means that fat on the side of the buttock and thigh is metabolically different from belly fat. Losing gluteal-femoral fat is notoriously difficult compared to losing abdominal fat, partly because the fat cells in this region have different receptor profiles and respond less aggressively to the hormones that mobilize stored energy. From a health standpoint, carrying fat on the hips and outer buttocks appears to be relatively protective, a fact that complicates the blanket advice to “lose weight” without specifying where.

Aging, Fatty Infiltration, and Fall Risk

The side glutes deserve special attention as you get older, because they appear to be among the first muscles to deteriorate in ways that increase fall risk. A study of community-dwelling older adults found that the gluteal muscles were the most affected by a process called fatty infiltration, where fat gradually replaces muscle fiber. People who had experienced falls showed lower muscle quality and higher fat infiltration in the gluteal muscles compared to non-fallers, along with weaker hip abduction strength. The strongest associations between muscle composition and joint strength were found in the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus.¹⁶

Separate research found that fatty degeneration of the gluteus minimus muscle could serve as an early warning sign for fall risk. The odds of falling roughly tripled for older adults with significant fatty degeneration of the gluteus medius.¹⁷ This isn’t something you’d notice by looking in a mirror; it happens inside the muscle and is only visible on imaging. But it underscores why targeted side-glute strengthening isn’t just about aesthetics or athletic performance. For older adults, keeping the gluteus medius and minimus strong and functional is directly linked to staying upright and independent. The exercises that rank highest for gluteus medius activation, like side-lying hip abduction and single-leg balance work, are the same ones that physical therapists prescribe for fall prevention.

When to See Someone About Side-Butt Pain

Because the lateral gluteal region sits at a crossroads of muscle, tendon, bone, and nerve, pain here can mean very different things. A few patterns are worth knowing. Pain that’s worst when lying on your side at night and tender right over the bony point of the hip suggests gluteal tendinopathy. Pain that radiates from the buttock down the back of the leg, especially past the knee, points more toward nerve involvement, whether from piriformis syndrome, sciatica, or another source of deep gluteal irritation. Pain that’s hard to localize and seems to shift between the buttock, lower back, and groin could involve the sacroiliac joint. And a dull ache across the side of the hip that worsens with prolonged sitting but improves with movement may reflect gluteal deconditioning rather than a structural injury.

The overlapping referral patterns in this area make self-diagnosis unreliable. If side-of-the-butt pain persists beyond a few weeks, worsens with weight-bearing, disrupts your sleep, or radiates down your leg, having a clinician pinpoint the actual structure involved saves you from months of treating the wrong thing. The gluteus medius, gluteus minimus, their tendons, the trochanteric bursa, the sciatic nerve, the sacroiliac joint, and even the lumbar spine can all produce symptoms that feel like they’re coming from the same spot.