Does Yoga Build Muscle?

While yoga can certainly help you establish a sense of inner peace and calm, it can also be a truly intense workout. This especially rings true for peak arm-balancing postures like Crow Pose (Kakasana) and Handstand (Adho Mukha Vrksasana), but also the likes of Chaturangas and Warrior poses… even more so if you repeat them often or do isometric holds for what feels like an eternity. While your muscles are aching and quaking after a challenging yoga class, you might wonder if all those sweaty flows can lead to new strength gains. Put simply: Does yoga build muscle?

We spoke with two experts on the subject to learn more: Denis Morton, a Peloton yoga instructor, and Raymond Agostino, a doctor of physical therapy and owner of Agostino Athletics in Fort Myers, Florida. Keep reading to get to the bottom of all things yoga, muscle, and strength.

Does Yoga Build Muscle?

Yoga can absolutely build muscle. 

“Yoga relies heavily on bodyweight exercises, which engage muscles through isometric contractions (holding poses like Plank or Warrior) and eccentric movements (lengthening muscles while under tension, as in lowering into Chair Pose),” Agostino explains. “These actions create mechanical stress, which signals the body to repair and strengthen muscle fibers.” This process not only builds muscle over time, but also improves muscular endurance and enhances overall strength.

Different types of yoga poses and sequences have the ability to help you build functional muscle, Denis explains. “Say you get into a lunge or a squat. [When] you hold that for long enough, you start to feel a burn,” he says. “What’s happening is your muscles are being damaged, and those little microscopic tears are going to repair, resulting in muscle growth.” 

But again, long holds aren’t the only opportunities to build muscle from yoga. More intense yoga flows—such as those in power yoga and Ashtanga—will add metabolic stress that contributes to muscle gains, he adds.

These challenging types of yoga are also beneficial since they often focus on full body engagement and stabilization, Agostino says. “This activates both major and smaller stabilizing muscles, which makes yoga powerful for functional strength and core stability.”

Should Yoga Replace Strength Training Exercises?

While yoga can count as a strength workout, you’ll need to combine it with other forms of resistance training in order to achieve peak muscle growth. So if maximal gains is your goal, you shouldn’t completely replace traditional strength training with yoga. But that doesn’t mean yoga won’t offer benefits for building strength, maintaining muscle, and more.

According to Agostino, yoga can be a valid standalone option if your primary goal is to build functional strength (aka train your body for everyday movements by improving balance, flexibility, mobility, and more). “It’s also a great way to protect against age-related muscle decline by maintaining muscle activation and joint health,” Agostino says. “Additionally, yoga supports active recovery while still providing strength benefits.”

However, you’ll want to opt for other forms of resistance training—namely weight lifting—to develop maximal strength and create a more efficient path to hypertrophy. That’s because weights provide the opportunity for progressive overload (or gradually increasing the stress on your body), a major factor of muscle growth and muscle architecture change. “In these cases, yoga works best as cross-training to complement your primary strength training regimen by improving mobility, balance, and mental focus,” Agostino says.

To put things into perspective, Denis says you can’t become a bodybuilder just by doing yoga. Nonetheless, it can still help those working to build muscle. “Yoga can help with coordination, flexibility, and range of motion. And the greater your range of motion, the greater range that you can build that muscle in,” he explains. “Almost anyone can benefit from the practice of yoga, even in pursuit of muscular development.”

How to Add Yoga to Your Strength Routine

Whether you want to improve functional strength or you’re focused on increasing muscle size, here’s how the pros recommend prioritizing yoga into your general fitness routine:

Yoga for Functional Strength

If you want to go about your daily life (and workouts) with more ease and stability, Denis recommends practicing yoga for 45–60 minutes three or more times a week. If yoga is your only source of training and building strength is a top goal for you, he suggests aiming for around four classes a week, ideally at a higher intensity.

It’s smart to establish a consistent routine and perform regular yoga “benchmarks” to check yourself against, Denis notes. This way, you’ll be better equipped to notice differences in strength and stability. 

“You’re going to have to be performing the same postures or flows repeatedly over time so that you can actually check yourself against your former self to create measurable results,” he explains. 

Over time, this could look like:

You can also take a Yoga Conditioning class on the Peloton App, which incorporates yoga with weights. These classes will create greater muscle engagement and sufficiently spice up your routine.

Weights for Maximal Strength and Hypertrophy (with Yoga as a Supplement)

For those with hypertrophy and maximal strength goals, Denis suggests prioritizing traditional weight training and using yoga as a form of cross-training. 

“The progressive overload provided by weights and resistance is essential for maximizing muscle growth, increasing maximal strength, and preparing for sports that require explosive power—outcomes that yoga alone cannot replicate,” Agostino adds.

If you’re using yoga to complement (rather than replace) a traditional strength training routine, Denis recommends hitting your mat anywhere from two to four times a week, as well as dialing down the intensity and perhaps even the time per session. “I would do a slower, less stressful yoga practice in order to increase flexibility, coordination, range of motion, and body awareness,” he says.

According to Agostino, yoga can complement a more intense strength training regimen by:

“The versatility of yoga makes it a cornerstone for building well-rounded fitness and long-term resilience,” Agostino says.

And just a reminder: The Peloton App has tons of great strength and yoga classes to choose from for any and every fitness goal.

5 Muscle-Building Yoga Poses to Try

No matter how you fit yoga into your strength routine, you might wonder if certain postures build muscle more effectively than others. Here, Denis shares his top-recommended yoga poses to build muscle—plus what they work and how to do them.

1. Chair Pose (Utkatasana)

“Chair Pose builds strength in your quads, glutes, back, shoulders, and arms,” Denis says. “Your thighs are also involved and you’re [working on] ankle mobility.”

2. High Lunge

“This is almost the exact same posture as Chair Pose, but with one leg extended back,” Denis shares. “Again, it builds your legs, glutes, back, and shoulders.”

3. Warrior 2 Pose (Virabhadrasana 2)

Denis says this pose (and its strengthening benefits) is similar to high lunge, just opened up to the sides instead of facing forward.

4. Plank Pose

Plank Pose will activate your shoulders, back, abs, glutes, and quads, Denis says.

To modify this pose, get creative with Plank variations.

5. Chaturanga

Chaturanga begins with Plank Pose, but makes it dynamic by working into a lower position. “This pose is going to get your triceps in a much more meaningful way than Plank,” Denis says.