16 Reasons Why Pilates Is So Much More Than a Trendy Workout

Pilates is much more than a trendy workout. For some, it can even be life-changing. No matter what goals and benefits you have in mind—be it strengthening your core and entire body, improving mobility, reducing stress, or simply finding a workout to truly enjoy—there’s a good chance that Pilates can help you achieve them.

Keep reading to discover the countless ways in which Pilates can enrich your exercise routine and your life.

What Is Pilates Actually Good For?

Pilates is good for everything from building strength, reducing pain, and enhancing overall wellbeing to sharpening your focus, and managing stress. The benefits of Pilates even go beyond perks for the body and mental health. As you’ll soon see, research shows that this form of mindful movement can help prevent certain chronic health issues.

None of this is all too surprising once you have a grasp of what Pilates is and why it was created. In the early 20th century, Joseph Pilates founded his namesake practice based on six principles:

The holistic practice of Pilates is intended to bring the body back into balance. This foundational principle applies no matter if you’re aiming to improve flexibility, gain or maintain strength, recover from injury, or foster mind-body awareness.

“Pilates was actually originally created as a companion/rehabilitative workout for dancers,” notes Peloton instructor Aditi Shah. The breathing exercises and movements offer both strengthening and restorative properties that can benefit dancers, athletes, and everyday people alike.

Physical Benefits of Pilates

Pilates has the potential to offer a myriad of benefits for your body and physical health. Here are some of the most impressive perks you can anticipate from a consistent Pilates practice.

1. It Strengthens Your Core

Core strength is among the most famed and coveted benefits of Pilates. Pilates ab exercises and other Pilates moves work not only the rectus abdominis (aka six-pack muscles) but also your entire powerhouse, including your:

There’s no shortage of benefits associated with a strong powerhouse, including but certainly not limited to improving balance and core endurance.

2. It Helps with Mobility and Functional Movement

“Pilates has a really strong focus on mobility through your spine and through your hip socket, [as well as] being able to use your body in a functional way that is really important as we age,” Aditi shares.

Simply put, Pilates can help you move more functionally throughout your day and for the years to come. Think: squatting at the gym or sitting down in a chair, breaking a sweat on the Peloton Row, or opening a door, or any movement in between.

3. It Improves Posture

Pilates is also good for your posture since “it engages the powerhouse muscles at the center of your body, which can help with stability, and a good pilates class will help you build proprioception—so you can better notice and support your posture on and off of the mat,” Aditi explains.

Per a 2024 systematic review in BMC Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation, Pilates can help to correct poor posture and even improve spinal deformities also by increasing the strength of the spine.

Note: Some people claim that Pilates can increase your height. While a Pilates practice and even stretching won’t make you taller, it may help you appear taller courtesy of its benefits for postural alignment.

4. It Promotes Flexibility

While flexibility tends to be a key benefit associated with yoga and stretching, it’s linked to Pilates as well. After all, Pilates is good for strengthening and lengthening.

A 2024 observational study published in the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies found that participants in an extreme conditioning program experienced significant improvements in flexibility after only a single Pilates session.

5. It Strengthens Your Entire Body

Yes, Pilates counts as strength training—not only for your core, but your full body. Pilates is good for helping build strength, as well as maintaining muscle.

“It's important to preserve muscle as you age, and Pilates helps support functional strength,” Aditi shares. (Just note that Pilates isn’t the gold standard for building muscle, so weightlifting is still important to include in your regimen.)

6. It Helps Relieve Pain

Remember: Pilates is ‘prescribed’ in many rehabilitation protocols, in part because it can help reduce pain. Perhaps your hips or lower back are tight from sitting too long, you’re dealing with the modern ailment of tech neck, or you’re dealing with localized pain from an injury.

The good news is that Pilates has been shown to be effective for a range of cases and populations, including:

7. It May Improve Body Composition

If reducing body fat is a goal of yours, a sizable body of research suggests that Pilates is good for improving body composition. Published in the Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport, a 2023 umbrella review of 27 meta-analyses found that Pilates can reduce body fat percentage and body mass index (BMI). Other studies have found that these results can be substantial in certain groups, including individuals with overweight or obesity and middle-aged women.

8. It Enhances Proprioception

“Pilates allows you to learn proprioception, which is getting to know your own body and where you are in space,” Aditi shares. “It's a workout in which you are paying close attention to how you're moving: not just the movement itself, but also what muscles you're using in order to move.”

For instance, when you’re doing a bicycle crunch in Pilates, you’ll be cued to focus on lifting your shoulders and engaging your powerhouse muscles rather than craning or straining your neck—the latter of which is common for those who are less conscious of what muscles require activation and which ones don’t.

“When you're aware of your body, you can pay attention to any movement,” Aditi continues. As such, she says that Pilates is a great complement to pretty much any other workout as you’ll be able to move with more body intelligence and integrity. For example, some people (Aditi included) find that the body awareness they develop during Pilates can translate to their runs, such as by making better contact with the ground and establishing healthier movement patterns.

9. It Can Reduce Risk of Injury

The heightened body awareness from Pilates won’t only help improve movements and performance; it may also have the built-in benefit of lowering your injury risk.

According to Aditi, Pilates is good for injury prevention courtesy of the coordination and concentration it requires.

10. It Helps Strengthen the Pelvic Floor

Per a 2020 study in The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, Pilates exercises with breath work can be helpful for contracting and lengthening the pelvic floor muscles. This study found that within 12 weeks, a twice-weekly mat Pilates regimen was able to effectively and sustainably reduce stress urinary incontinence (SUI) in middle-aged and older women. Since pregnancy, childbirth, menopause, and obesity are all risk factors for SUI, practicing Pilates could help (always clear this with a medical professional). 

11. It May Improve Sexual Function

Now, for a potentially surprising benefit of Pilates: mitigating sexual dysfunction.

A small 2023 study with 36 female participants investigated the effects of Pilates on women aged 20 to 50 with sexual dysfunction. Within 12 weeks, all domains of the Female Sexual Function Index significantly improved (as did their scores for depression). The researchers concluded that Pilates may be a worthy part of treatment for women who have trouble experiencing satisfaction or pleasure from sexual activity.

12. It Promotes a Healthy Lifestyle

If you’re committed to making lifestyle changes to enhance wellbeing across the board, Pilates can give you the motivation and encouragement to see things through.

Per a 2021 study in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, those new to Pilates who embarked on an 8-week program were able to “recruit health-promoting behaviors … and engender positive beliefs about their subjective health status, thereby setting a positive reinforcement cycle in motion.”

Participants who began Pilates had significantly greater improvements than those in the yoga and control groups in six areas of well-being:

Simply put, Pilates isn’t only good for a core-strengthening, spine-lengthening workout. It’s also a wellness investment that can help enrich your relationships to others and yourself, fosters accountability, and supports healthier choices.

Mental Benefits of Pilates

Of course, the benefits of Pilates aren’t limited to body-specific wins and physical health alone. Many people love the practice for mind and mood boosts, too.

1. It Can Reduce Stress, Anxiety, and Depression

Moving your body and focusing on your breath can have powerful mental health benefits of their own. Yet, according to Aditi, pairing the two together in Pilates are powerful to help overcome stress, calm your nervous system, and circulate feel-good endorphins.

Per a 2018 meta-analysis in Complementary Therapies in Medicine, Pilates can significantly help reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety.

2. It Energizes and Revitalizes You

According to the same review cited above, Pilates has been shown to significantly increase energy and reduce fatigue. This isn’t too surprising since stress and mood imbalances take a major toll on your energy levels and sleep quality.

Moreover, many people enjoy the fact that while Pilates can certainly be challenging, you’re still likely to end your class feeling better in your mind and body.

3. It Sharpens Your Focus

Pilates will also give your brain a workout since you have to simultaneously hone in on your breath, balance, muscles, and movements.

“Pilates requires moment to moment presence and concentration, which can help increase your focus and awareness,” says Aditi. This form of mindful movement is particularly great for those who need some space from their thoughts and stressors, as you need to be tuned into the present moment to practice safely and effectively.

4. It Boosts Self-Esteem

“With Pilates and any consistent practice, when you show up over and over again, you strengthen your self-esteem, your confidence, and your belief in yourself,” Aditi shares. “You start to feel how you can do something, and you also learn how to pick yourself back up when you've fallen.”

In short, committing to your practice can thus promote resilience and a sense of self-worth and accomplishment.

How to Start Practicing Pilates

Now that you’re aware of the many things that Pilates is good for, you might be ready to kickstart your practice. Here are a few quick tips and FYIs you’ll want to keep in mind.

Start Slowly

Aditi advises taking your time to get comfortable with beginner-friendly Pilates moves and classes instead of challenging yourself too much at first. In addition to taking a slow and steady approach, focusing on proper form and body awareness are also key, as you’ll start to realize what muscles are activated as well as what may compromise your position.

“I say this in every single class: It's not about lifting your leg, it's about how you're lifting your leg and what you're using to lift your leg,” Aditi emphasizes.

Modify As Much As You Need

Modifications are also key, no matter if you’re new to Pilates or a long-time practitioner. Tuning into your body and being honest about what’s accessible to you on any given day will ensure that you’ll actually reap the benefits of Pilates—sans discomfort or injury. “It's really important to give yourself permission to modify and to be where you are, because it's just going to benefit you in getting to where you wanna go,” Aditi shares.

She suggests changing your range of motion or using other forms of support to modify Pilates exercises as needed. For example, this could look like using your hands to protect your neck during Pilates Hundreds, or even leaving your head on the mat. 

“If it doesn't feel good for you to be rolling around on your back or if you're a little bony, double up your mats, add a towel, or do something that makes the practice itself comfortable,” Aditi adds. “There are always ways to modify to make things feel safe and comfortable in your body.”

Stream Pilates Classes for Beginners

If you’re new to Pilates, Aditi recommends streaming beginner Pilates classes on the Peloton App. These classes will help you get more familiar with foundational moves and proper form, all the while offering a fun challenge and a fantastic workout.

The Takeaway

Since Pilates is good for so many aspects of physical, mental, and even emotional health, there’s a world of benefit to be had from starting or continuing your practice. You might even begin with only one goal in mind and achieve well beyond that.

“Keep practicing because every day isn't going to be the same. One day, you might be surprised at the way that Pilates shows up in your life in a really great way,” says Aditi.