Squat to a box to nail depth and build explosive power out of the hole.
Sit back onto the box, don't just drop, and never relax fully once you touch it.
Squatting back onto a box does two things at once: it standardises your depth on every single rep, and the brief pause on the box kills the stretch reflex, forcing your quads and glutes to fire from a dead stop. That builds raw starting strength out of the hole that carries straight over to your regular squat. The slightly wider, sit back setup also grooves proper hip loading for lifters who collapse forward.
Set it at your target squat depth, usually where your hip crease hits parallel. Beginners can start a touch higher and work down. The box is a depth gauge and a pause point, not a seat to plop onto.
You touch and pause under control, but you never relax. Keep your whole body tight, hips and core loaded, then drive straight up. Fully unloading on the box and jerking back up is how backs get hurt.
They are a tool, not a replacement. Box squats build explosive strength from the bottom and fix inconsistent depth, which makes them great as a secondary squat variation or for lifters learning to sit back. Your free squat still comes first.
