I've been doing deadlifts for about 4 months now and lately my lower back gets really sore during and after sessions. I'm pretty sure my form is decent - I watch videos before each workout - but the pain is starting to worry me. Should I just stop deadlifting for a while, or is there something I can do to train through it?
Get your form checked in person by someone who actually knows deadlifts - videos help but they can't see what you're doing wrong from the side, and even small issues snowball into back pain! Take a week or two completely off deadlifts, then come back with lighter weight and way more focus on keeping your spine neutral and not rounding your lower back, because pushing through real pain is how you end up injured for months.
Pain during the lift itself is usually a sign something's off with positioning or load - even small form issues get amplified under heavy weight, and videos can't catch what's happening from every angle. Before you stop deadlifting entirely, try dropping the weight back significantly and filming yourself from the side, then posting to a form-check community where people can actually see what you're doing; most folks find the issue once someone watches them move rather than just hearing about it.
One thing that often gets skipped: your core might not be bracing hard enough. A lot of people think they're engaging their abs but they're only doing it halfway - try taking a bigger breath into your belly before each rep and really holding it tight before you start the pull. The difference between a casual brace and a real one is night and day for lower back stability, and it costs nothing to experiment with.
Before you do anything else, figure out *where* exactly the soreness hits - is it a sharp pinch in one spot during the lift, a dull ache across your whole lower back after, or more of a muscle fatigue thing? That distinction matters a lot for what's actually wrong.
The thing previous answers missed: try deadlifting with a trap bar if your gym has one, or even just switching to deficit deadlifts (standing on a small platform) for a few weeks. Both change the mechanics enough that you might bypass whatever positioning issue is bugging your spine without losing the movement entirely. Honestly though, if it's sharp or shooting pain rather than just soreness, you should get someone to watch you lift in person - videos really can't catch everything, especially asymmetries or how your pelvis tilts under load.
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