Beyond the First Lift: How Exoskeleton Training Unlocks the Full Potential

This is an interesting one: Auxivo’s R&D team began noticing something curious — experienced users of our exoskeletons often showed significantly higher support levels than first-time users. Was this just a result of better fitting? Or was something deeper at play? In this post, we share how we turned this observation into a structured scientific investigation — one that involved dozens of participants, thousands of squat lifts, and a lot of sweat — to find out whether exoskeletons become more effective over time.

How it started

In our daily work at Auxivo, we frequently run biomechanical measurements — whether during internal product development or in collaboration with research partners. These often involve electromyography (EMG) to measure the reduction in muscle activity that occurs when someone wears an exoskeleton.

And we noticed something interesting: our own team members always seemed to benefit more from our LiftSuit back support exoskeleton than external first-time users.

At first, we thought this could be explained by fit. Our team knows the LiftSuit inside out — we’re trained to put it on correctly, adjust it precisely, and activate it properly. Could it be that we were just better at using it?

But another explanation intrigued us more: perhaps experienced users have actually adapted to the exoskeleton over time. Maybe their brains and bodies have learned to rely on the device — to hand over more of the workload — and that this learning process leads to significantly better support.

Looking at the science

Previous studies have often tested exoskeletons in first-time users. One even found no difference in muscle activity before and after familiarization — but that study involved just 180 squat lifts. In contrast, our team had many thousands of lifts under their belts. That got us wondering: how much time and training do the body and mind really need to adapt to an exoskeleton?

Designing the study

To answer that question, we designed a structured study together with ETH Zürich. We recruited 21 participants who had never used an exoskeleton before. Each of them performed 1,000 squat lifts across four sessions, wearing the LiftSuit.

The fitting and activation of the exoskeleton were always performed with the assistance of a certified trainer, thereby eliminating the risk that these factors might influence the outcome.

The four sessions were spaced out with at least 48 hours in between, allowing time for motor learning processes to take place. In neuroscience, this refers to the process by which the brain and body refine movements through practice, improving coordination and efficiency. An important part of this process are so-called consolidation phases — time between training sessions during which new movement patterns are stabilized during rest, particularly during sleep. The intense training sessions and the spacing between them helped participants gradually become familiar with the exoskeleton and integrate it into their movements.

To see if support increased over time, we measured back muscle activity of the participants using EMG — both before and after the training period.

The results surprised us

When analyzing the data, the results surprised even us. While we had hypothesized that support would increase with familiarization, the improvements we observed went well beyond our expectations.

• In static forward-leaning tasks, muscle activity reductions doubled after familiarization — from ~20% to nearly 40%.

• In dynamic squat lifting:

  • Upper back relief increased from 23% to 29%

  • Lower back relief increased from 10% to 21%

This suggests that significant adaptation occurs over time. Simply put: users get better at using exoskeletons — and the exoskeleton support becomes more effective — the more they work together.

The takeaway

The practical takeaway is clear: when planning to implement exoskeletons in the workplace, it is essential to include a familiarization period. Early impressions can be misleading—not only may the device feel unfamiliar or even awkward at first, but users might also not immediately experience its full support. However, with time and repeated use, users often stop noticing the exoskeleton, while the effective relief of muscle load can significantly increase, as our results show. Giving people the opportunity to adapt naturally leads to more accurate evaluations and better long-term outcomes.

For researchers and product developers, these findings underscore the importance of accounting for user familiarization when designing studies and interpreting results, as measuring exoskeleton performance based on first-time use may underestimate their true potential.

Sharing our findings with the community

The results of this study will be shared with the broader exoskeleton research and practitioner community. We presented our findings at two key events: the 30th Congress of the European Society of Biomechanics in Zurich and will present them in the WearRAcon Europe 2025 conference in Düsseldorf. Abstracts containing detailed methodology and results are being published as part of these conferences, contributing to the growing understanding of how familiarization influences exoskeleton performance.

Want to learn more?

If you're interested in applying these findings to your own work environment, exploring the LiftSuit, or collaborating on future research, we'd love to hear from you. Get in touch with us to start a conversation — and let’s explore how exoskeletons can bring long-term relief and performance benefits to your team.