BACKGROUND: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pneumosepsis survivors are at a high risk of developing ICU acquired weakness (ICUAW), due to high incidence of acute respiratory distress syndrome and the common need for prolonged invasive ventilation. It remains unknown if regular post-pneumosepsis physical rehabilitation strategies are suitable for this extraordinary patient category. METHODS: We retrospectively compared the physical recovery of COVID-19 and non-COVID pneumosepsis ICU survivors between ICU- and hospital discharge, defined as the difference in performance on the Medical Research Council Sum-Score (MRC-SS), Chelsea Critical Care Physical Assessment tool (CPAx), and percentage of predicted handgrip strength (POP-HGS). An ANCOVA model was built using age, sex, Barthel-index, BMI, admission APACHE-II score, adequacy of protein delivery during ICU stay and ward length of stay as covariates. RESULTS: 35 COVID-19 ICU patients could be compared to 21 non-COVID pneumosepsis ICU survivors. All patients scored </=48 on the MRC-SS at ICU discharge, indicating ICUAW. ICUAW had resolved in more COVID-19, than in non-COVID patients upon hospital discharge, although not significantly (52% vs. 22%, p = .081). When controlling for covariates, COVID-19 patients performed worse on all physical functioning assessments upon ICU discharge, but had improved more at hospital discharge on the MRC-SS (n(2) = 0.214, p = .002) and CPAx (n(2) = 0.153, p = .011). POP-HGS remained lower in COVID-19 patients throughout hospital stay. CONCLUSION: COVID-19 ICU-survivors are a vulnerable group concerning ICUAW, but they show better tendency towards physical rehabilitation than non-COVID pneumosepsis ICU-survivors during the post-ICU hospitalization period regarding MRC-SS and CPAx. COVID-19 ICU patients might benefit from early, more intensive physical therapy. CLINICAL RELEVANCY STATEMENT: COVID-19 ICU survivors are at high risk for ICU-acquired weakness, which is well known to have immense personal and societal consequences. As the group of COVID-19 ICU survivors is quickly growing world-wide, insight into their requirements for optimal physical rehabilitation and methods of assessing these is of paramount importance. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.