On We Go: yoga teachers’ pay in 2026

This is neither short nor soundbites; this is a reasonably long article (about 2,000 words) that aspires to be helpful – because this is important material for all yoga teachers.

It is good to keep things simple and straightforward. Such as it is essential that yoga teachers talk about money and pay rates and working conditions. Such as it is essential that we are realistic: we live in this world with its costs and cashflows, with the balancing of different balls, with sometimes the struggle to stay afloat in stormy seas.

It is important to make this statement: running a yoga studio can be incredibly challenging. Monies pouring out (heating, business rates, advertising, wages) and worries about money coming in. The list of yoga studios that have gone under in recent years – sunk in the stormy seas – is very long. There is a wide variety of yoga studios: from glossy corporates in upmarket locations to chains offering cheap deals, from franchises focusing on expansion to local community studios. Some making significant profits (yes this can happen), some just about surviving, some sinking in the seas. Many different circumstances.

The same is true for teachers – the many different circumstances. From teachers who were wealthy before they were teaching to teachers who are on Universal Credit because their income is so low; from teachers just about managing to teachers being financially supported by well-paid partners. If we are serious about yoga teaching being grounded in sustainability and inclusivity, we must do our best to make this work financially viable for everyone. Pay is undeniably a crucial part of the lived reality of being a yoga teacher. We must talk about money – to say (as some have) that it is “unyogic” to discuss pay rates is in my opinion misguided. This is a view that comes from privilege.

ECONOMIC CIRCUMSTANCES

The reality is that for many people – including studio owners, yoga teachers and yoga practitioners – economic circumstances are tough. Living expenses have dramatically increased since 2020. And there are all the other balls that require attention. Yoga teacher and marketing expert Laura Campbell said this about teaching in 2026: “You’ll need a good website. You’ll design your own graphics in Canva. You’ll manage multiple social media accounts. You’ll need a booking system. Or a card reader. Probably both. You’ll need to understand keywords and optimisation. You’ll be making reels. Logos. Email campaigns…this is the reality for today’s teachers… I’ll say it clearly: it’s overwhelming. It brings up comparison. It can chip away at your confidence. And you wonder along the way what happened to the yoga?”

So here is some good news. A studio in north London – the Reset Room – is paying teachers £50 per hour plus extra per head; and for teachers with more than 10 years of experience, the pay is £60 per hour plus extra per head. Another north London studio – Yoga On The Lane – increased the teachers’ pay this year to £40 per hour with £4 per person after six people.

In comparison is MoreYoga (which has more than 35 studios in London, employs more than 400 teachers and has about 1,300 weekly classes); MoreYoga pay their teachers one of three rates: £32, £35 or £38. One MoreYoga teacher commented about these pay rates: “They say it’s down to how long you’ve been teaching for them, in reality it’s down to how packed your classes are.” It is common knowledge that a vital factor in how busy classes are is day and time. Another comparison is Third Space (which has 13 studios in London and is expanding); here teachers have six pay rates ranging from£35 per hour to£60 per hour (very few of their teachers on that top rate).

At OrangeYoga in Cheltenham, the owners wrote to me: “Teachers pay, the short answer is 50% gross. The longer answer – we take gross studio income for the month, divide it by number of student visits and then pay teachers 50% based on how many were in the class… 50% means that our popular teachers earn around £100 per class. Over 60% of teachers earn over £50 per class. 95%+ earn over £30.” At some gyms and leisure centres, the hourly pay can be as low as £20 – perhaps an average could be about £30 per hour (with a few paying senior teachers £35 per hour). One teacher commented: “It’s a tough way to make a living…. I know I used to earn £45 per hour 25 years ago. It’s definitely not followed inflation.”

AVERAGE PAY

A survey of yoga teachers’ pay last year found that about 70% earned between £26 and £40 per class; and the average pay in gyms was £27.12 per class (whereas the average pay for independently run classes was £39.83). We have to be clear that these rates need to be divided by at least 2.5 to take into account all the extra work that happens around teaching. That means for example the average pay in gyms is more like £11 per hour (the UK minimum wage is £12.21; and the real living wage – based on what people need to live – is £13.45 across the UK and £14.80 in London). Words from someone who has been teaching for a long time: “The ethics have been buried in the wave of hyper capitalism and talking about it is a way to address it.”

While £30 for an hour’s teaching may superficially sound reasonable, it is necessary to put this figure into context. An hour’s class involves about 30 extra minutes (and sometimes more if the teacher is also managing reception) of setting up and answering students’ questions. Once travel time and costs are included, this rate is reduced even further. And then there are expenses such as insurance, membership organisations and marketing costs. And as freelancers, teachers do not receive sick pay, holiday pay or employer pension contributions.

When all these extra costs are factored in, even the more favourable rates make earning a decent income difficult. One teacher succinctly summarised their experience: “far too many days where unpaid hours are long and paid hours are short.” In these circumstances, feelings of isolation and failing can be common – the demons of not being good enough with consequences such as teachers not appropriately valuing their work.

WORKSHOP PAYMENTS

With workshops, there is a variety of how studios pay their teachers. At MoreYoga, the teacher gets about 40% of the workshop income; at the LifeCentre in Notting Hill the teacher is paid about 49.3% of workshop income; recently the Shala (now called Vahni) in south London increased the teachers’ share of workshop income to 55%. At the Reset Room, the teacher receives 60% of workshop income. And at OrangeYoga and Yantra yoga (in Norwich), the teacher receives 70% of workshop income.

For workshops, on occasion a studio might deduct VAT from the income before making the split. This does not need to happen – if the studio structures the workshop under an agency arrangement, then the studio only pays VAT on its share of the revenue and not the teachers share. This clearly resolves the issue of whether the dividing of workshop income is before or after VAT 

Anna Taylor, a well-established teacher, wrote: “The balance between the paid and unpaid aspects of teaching makes it increasingly challenging to earn a sustainable living. I do worry that this will make the profession restricted to those who don’t need the income. In my experience, in years gone by, studios would play a more active role in marketing whereas now the onus is placed more on the teachers. My fear is that this can lead to studios choosing teachers based on Instagram numbers, while being a ‘successful’ yoga teacher becomes more about creating slick ‘content’ than skilful teaching.”

In the view of another teacher who is also a marketing expert: “If the teacher is part of the studio, the studio should be supporting them fully with marketing as it benefits both parties… On the marketing/Instagram note, I think we all know that being good at marketing does not equate to being good at teaching – and if we’re honest – often the opposite is true.”

Another issue is the pressure to do more trainings. Extra hours of training can help our teaching confidence, can give us more skills so that we are able to benefit those in our classes and can deepen our knowledge and understanding of these practices. Yet the fact is that unfortunately more hours of training does not automatically equate to more pay. Sometimes, spending money on good quality mentoring might be better for us as yoga teachers than doing another CPD course. And it has to be said that some CPD courses are not very good.

For myself, I pay £27 per hour to the two people who are do admin and social media work for me; when I have an assistant on a course, I pay them £140 per day (so £700 for a five-day course); and I pay £300 to those who teach a three-hour session on courses. For myself, I aspire to do my best to make yoga a practice that empowers rather than excludes. This means teachers are properly paid and that this pay keeps pace with inflation – because when this does not happen, living standards are inevitably eroded.

SUTRAS AND SOLIDARITY

I know that some teachers undercut fellow teachers. I know that some teachers promote their own events and collect email addresses when they are covering someone else’s class (which is not ethical behaviour). I know that some teachers are unreliable. I know that some teachers are more familiar with the sutras than the lived-in experience of community and solidarity. I know that some long-established teachers are content on their lucrative pedestals while many other teachers swim in the choppy waters of economic hardships and precarious work. I know some independently wealthy teachers price their classes low (because they can afford to do this) which undermines those teachers who are more financially dependent on teaching yoga. 

Back to good news: it is important to acknowledge that some yoga teachers’ pay has increased in the last six years (though often not keeping pace with inflation). This is a situation worth celebrating. Because prior to 2020, pay rates had remained broadly the same for about 20 years. It is true that publicising pay rates and teachers requesting more pay from studios does make a real difference. Challenging management to pay more when a company is expanding makes complete sense; I know of at least one case when this speaking up resulted in significant pay rises. Words from a teacher: “I remember your earliest article on the topic really expanding my perspective and lighting a fire in my belly to keep talking about it with other teachers in my sphere.”

Discussing our pay and our conditions does empower. A studio owner wrote: “It’s good to keep all this stuff in the open.” A teacher wrote: “We need to have our eyes open, so we can make clear choices about where we put our energy.” Being clear that we are yoga teachers rather than content managers. Being clear that transparency and openness are crucial tools. These tools can diminish the danger of taking on too much and can lessen the risk of being burnt out. These tools can make yoga teaching more sustainable and more inclusive. We must actively connect with other teachers and make solidarity part of our practice. We need to be engaged because this is about changing cultures and questioning hierarchies. This is about recognising our strengths and standing in our power.

My thanks to the 20 yoga teachers who commented on this article and gave feedback. A good example of hive mind and collective solidarity.

Footnotes

This is an excellent resource – a survey of yoga teachers’ pay and working conditions: https://www.santoshamarketing.co.uk/yoga-teacher-benchmark-2026

The Yoga Teachers Union website is here: https://yogateachersunion.co.uk