The Ultimate Guide To Burning Calories With Yoga

How many calories can you burn by practicing yoga regularly? Discover the most effective yoga styles to lose weight, get in shape, and reach your body goals.

Yoga is an effective way to balance body, mind, and spirit, and feel great in your own skin at the same time. Many yogis continue practicing because of the way yoga makes them feel.

Weight loss and calorie burning are some of the many benefits of yoga for your health and well-being. Vigorous and intense yoga practice makes you sweat, raises your heart rate, and boosts your metabolism.

Yoga is can be a powerful full-body workout. The number of expended calories depends on your level of practice, the type of yoga, your gender, body type, size, and age.

Slow yoga styles such as Iyengar Yoga and Hatha Yoga burn fewer calories. But they still have positive effects on your body in many other ways.

More intense types of yoga such as Power Yoga and Bikram Yoga burn a lot more calories. They are very effective to increase blood flow and calorie expenditure.

Overall, yoga is the healthiest and safest way to get in shape and reach your body goals. It improves posture, balance, and stability, as well as strength, flexibility, and stamina.

If you want to get fit and reap many other benefits for your mental and spiritual self, yoga is your best bet. Let’s find out why.

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Calories you can burn by doing yoga, class by class

Yoga makes you burn a various amount of calories depending on the type of practice. It varies from 100 to 500 calories per hour depending on the person. Very active types of yoga burn more calories than gentle yoga styles.

Iyengar Yoga

Iyengar Yoga focuses on precision and alignment. Practitioners use props to ease into the different postures. It's not a very vigorous type of yoga. The poses are held for quite some time.

Calories burned: between 150 and 200 calories per hour.

Hatha Yoga

Hatha Yoga is a general type of yoga that includes any practice of asanas. This yoga style usually is a more gentle and relaxed practice accessible to beginners. It's great for flexibility and learning the basics.

Calories burned: between 175 and 300 calories per hour.

Ashtanga Yoga

Ashtanga Yoga is a dynamic yoga practice. It's a very structured type of yoga that requires strength and endurance. It provides a good cardiovascular workout where sequences are done in the same order.

Calories burned: between 350 and 550 calories per hour.

Power Yoga

Power Yoga is derived from Ashtanga Yoga. It aims to make it accessible to more people. It offers a powerful aerobic workout without being as rigorous as Ashtanga Yoga.

Calories burned: between 350 and 550 calories per hour.

Vinyasa Yoga

Vinyasa Yoga is a general type of yoga that suggests intense flowing movements. Postures are practiced smoothly one after the other without holding them too long. The constant movement ensures a stable calorie burn.

Calories burned: between 450 and 600 calories per hour.

Hot Yoga

Hot Yoga is a general style of yoga that uses heat to increase flexibility and blood flow. Generally practiced in a heated room in temperate countries, it aims to reproduce the climatic conditions of India.

Calories burned: between 400 and 500 calories per hour.

Bikram Yoga

Bikram Yoga is a style of Hot Yoga. The practice is always set in the heat and offers the same 26 poses with 2 breathing exercises. It makes you sweat and raises your heart rate quite a bit.

Calories burned: between 400 and 500 calories per hour.

How calories burned with yoga help you lose weight

The amount of calories burned in yoga depends on many factors. The intensity and type of yoga practice play a big role in calorie burning. It also depends on your body type, size, gender, and age.

If you hold Child’s pose or Pigeon pose for a long time, you will not burn as many calories as doing Sun Salutations. To raise calorie counts, vigorous movement is necessary throughout the whole practice.

To lose weight, regularly practice a physical activity that you enjoy. It isn't necessary to count calories. Yoga is a wonderful way to get in touch with your body and not like any other exercise.

Yoga not only gives you a real workout but also influences weight loss in many other ways. There is a lot more to weight loss than just physical exercise.

The other benefits of regular yoga practice

While many yoga styles burn fewer calories than jogging or cycling, they provide many other benefits for your body and your mind.

Yoga can relieve stress and increase mindfulness, leading to a higher awareness of your food choices and the adoption of healthier living habits.

Moreover with regular yoga practice, expect a toned and fit body, increased energy levels, better mood, and overall health. There is so much more to yoga than just calories burning.

Yoga has very positive psychological effects on its practitioners. It gives more consciousness and control over what you consume, limiting overeating and unhealthy dietary choices.

The emotional connection to food is a key factor in weight gain. Many people oversee the emotional reasons behind binge eating. Yoga is one of the healthiest and most effective ways to lose weight.

Calorie burning tips for beginners

Not every yoga practice is made of gentle stretching and chanting. If you are a beginner, even easy yoga poses might be difficult to practice. Many asanas require a certain amount of flexibility, strength, and endurance.

Dynamic yoga styles like Vinyasa Yoga, Power Yoga, and Ashtanga Yoga are very effective in burning calories. Practiced at advanced levels, they will get you toned and back in shape in no time.

To burn the most calories with yoga, choose classes that incorporate lots of strength-based poses and vigorous movements. Sun Salutations are a great way to lose weight for beginners.

Get your whole body moving to build strong and long muscles for the best results. Raise your heart rate to increase your metabolism and calorie-burning rate.

Losing weight with yoga

You will get rid of excess body fat if you practice yoga regularly. To lose weight, you have to expend more calories than you eat daily. And yoga helps you achieve that.

The number of calories you burn doing yoga depends on your practice intensity. Usually, a beginner will expend fewer calories than an advanced yogi.

But don't worry. With patience and commitment, you will be able to do what you never imagined you could before. You can reach your body goals through yoga.

Yoga helps you burn more than enough calories to lose weight. A healthy weight loss rate is around 1 pound per week. Burning 500 calories during every yoga practice is more than enough to lose that amount of weight.

If you try to burn more calories, you risk over-exercising. Cutting down how many calories you eat isn't a solution either. You could suffer from eating disorders or deficiencies.

Instead, listen to your body closely. Eat when you are hungry.

Yoga will make you more attuned to your body to regulate your appetite and hunger easily. You can also accurately tell when you are full through the increased mindfulness acquired by doing yoga.

Make sure to choose a physical activity that you can enjoy long term. Pick the right type of yoga for you. Combine it with a healthy yoga diet for the best results.

To wrap it up

The number of calories burned while doing yoga varies according to practice intensity and the type of yoga. Vigorous and dynamic yoga practices such as Ashtanga Yoga, Power Yoga, and Vinyasa Yoga burn lots of calories.

Other yoga styles such as Hatha Yoga and Iyengar Yoga burn fewer calories. But yoga is much more than calorie counting. Gentle yoga practices are still effective to lose weight in other ways.

Regular practice relieves stress and improves mindfulness. Better sleep, digestion, and a relationship with food lead to weight loss success.

Yoga is a journey toward self-discovery. It helps you tune in with your body, thoughts, and emotions. It helps with weight management in many ways.

The number of calories burned during each yoga class helps. But yoga is much more than that. Especially with a mindful approach to eating, yoga ensures long term success.

Yoga is also very useful to relieve stress and anxiety and limit emotional eating. It helps adopt healthy dietary habits and to listen to your body needs and differentiate foods that make you feel amazing from those that aren't digested so well.

Overall, yoga helps you avoid unhealthy behaviors and take better care of yourself.

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Alex Assoune (MS) is a global health and environmental advocate. He founded Panaprium to inspire others with conscious living, ethical, and sustainable fashion. Alex has worked in many countries to address social and environmental issues. He speaks three languages and holds two Master of Science degrees in Engineering from SIGMA and IFPEN schools.