The aim of this paper is to investigate upper bounds for the maximum degree of the elements of any minimal Janet basis of an ideal generated by a set of homogeneous polynomials. The presented bounds depend on the number of variables and the maximum degree of the generating set of the ideal. For this purpose, by giving a deeper analysis of the method due to Dube (SIAM J Comput 19:750–773, 1990), we improve (and correct) his bound on the degrees of the elements of a reduced Grobner basis. By giving a simple proof, it is shown that this new bound is valid for Pommaret bases, as well. Furthermore, based on Dube’s method, and by introducing two new notions of genericity, so-called J-stable position and prime position, we show that Dube’s (new) bound holds also for the maximum degree of polynomials in any minimal Janet basis of a homogeneous ideal in any of these positions. Finally, we study the introduced generic positions by proposing deterministic algorithms to transform any given homogeneous ideal into these positions.