How Much Do Yoga Instructors Make?
Most yoga teachers do not live on yoga alone. In the 2016 Yoga in America study by Yoga Journal and Yoga Alliance, only 29% of teachers said yoga was their primary source of income. The official pay figures count yoga teachers together with personal trainers and group fitness instructors, because BLS treats them as one job.
Pay comes per class, per hour or per private session, and where you teach changes it. Type your ZIP code below to see the official figures for your area, then use the calculator to work out a year from your own classes.
The rest of this page is about which of these you would be.
Fitness and yoga instructors' median pay runs from $20,800 a year in rural eastern Mississippi to $73,910 around Stamford, Connecticut
Type a ZIP code to see what fitness and yoga instructors earn where you work. The figures are official BLS pay data for 473 of 528 metro and rural areas; the other 55 use their state's figure. All 40,767 US ZIP codes are matched. BLS counts employed instructors only, and personal trainers are in the same figures.
Sources: BLS May 2025 area wages for exercise trainers and group fitness instructors, the occupation that includes yoga instructors; the Census 2020 ZIP-to-county file; USDA rural-urban codes. Where BLS publishes no figure for an area, the tool uses the state's. BLS is the only source with pay by area. No agency publishes per-class or private rates by area, so the calculator applies the area's pay level to them too; that is our assumption, not a measurement. The lookup runs in your browser and loads only a small file for the first three digits of your ZIP code from this site.
Massachusetts pays fitness and yoga instructors the most, Mississippi the least
The column is the median pay of employed exercise trainers and group fitness instructors in each state, May 2025, the occupation BLS puts yoga instructors in. Personal trainers are in it; the self-employed are not. Small states rest on few jobs: Mississippi's median comes from 1,260.
| State | Fitness and yoga instructors, median a year (BLS May 2025) |
|---|---|
| United States | $47,160 |
| Highest five | |
| Massachusetts | $64,620 |
| Connecticut | $61,580 |
| New Jersey | $59,870 |
| Oregon | $58,510 |
| California | $57,990 |
| Lowest five | |
| Mississippi | $30,540 |
| Nebraska | $31,440 |
| Indiana | $34,960 |
| Kansas | $35,900 |
| Iowa | $36,160 |
| Most people employed in this job | |
| New York | $47,090 |
| Illinois | $46,800 |
| Texas | $40,880 |
| Florida | $38,800 |
| Virginia | $40,820 |
| Pennsylvania | $45,250 |
BLS May 2025 state medians for exercise trainers and group fitness instructors (39-9031), the occupation that names yoga instructor as an example. Employees only; the self-employed are not counted. BLS publishes no yoga-only figure. Puerto Rico is left out of the ranking.
The biggest pay decision: teach on a studio's schedule, or build your own classes and privates
Most of what a yoga teacher earns comes down to whose students fill the room. Studio, chain and gym pay is posted per class or per hour, and the employed side is in the BLS figure. Your own classes and privates are not: BLS leaves out the self-employed, and Yoga Alliance publishes no income figure.
The calculator below runs three ways of working.
Work out what you would make before tax
Put in your own numbers to see a year three ways: studio classes, a gym class at Equinox's posted rate, or your own private sessions. If you entered a ZIP code above, the rate follows local pay levels.
- Classes and sessions you teach in a year$19,200
- Your share$19,200
Example figures from the sources named, checked in October 2026. Tax, room rent, insurance, travel and unpaid planning time are not taken off. CorePower pays by the hour, not the class, and schedules its teachers 30 minutes before and after each class. The 3% card fee is close to a card processor's published US rate, 2.9% plus 30 cents a payment. With a ZIP code entered, the rate follows that area's fitness and yoga instructor pay level, our assumption.
Yoga instructors are on the IRS list of tipped jobs, entry 608, so the 2025 to 2028 tips deduction can cover them
No survey measures how often yoga teachers are tipped. The deduction helps only with tips a student actually gives. These are the federal rules as the IRS states them, not tax advice.
Entry 608 is "Exercise trainers and group fitness instructors," with "aerobics trainer, yoga instructor, personal trainer" as example titles. It maps to occupation code 39-9031, the same one behind the BLS pay figures on this page.
It applies to qualified tips received in occupations on the IRS list, and entry 608 names yoga instructors. Employees and the self-employed can both claim it.
For the self-employed, the deduction cannot exceed the net income of the business in which the tips were earned.
Final IRS regulations list more than 70 occupations. Qualified tips must be paid voluntarily by the customer, not be subject to negotiation, and be reported on a W-2, 1099-NEC, 1099-MISC, 1099-K or Form 4137.
What yoga teachers and studios say they pay and earn
These cards hold the US yoga pay figures we found published by teachers or employers themselves. Two are teachers' own numbers, unverified, labeled with the period as they said it. Two are employers' posted pay. One teacher sells trainings to other teachers, and her card says so.
Twelve public classes a week at $35 to $50, about $42.50 on average, plus a weekly private and a monthly workshop. One retreat paid about $5,000. His advice: keep your day job.
27 people at $33 early-bird or $40, and $200 for the room. She says studios pay $30 a class on average. She sells yoga teacher trainings and class plans to teachers.
Teachers are employees, teach at least two classes a week, and are scheduled 30 minutes before and after each class. New York City studios post $25.00; Dallas posts $15.63.
Seattle posts $21.30 an hour for non-class work and Chevy Chase $17.95. This is the employer's pay-transparency line, not an instructor's statement.
That is the one teacher-income figure Yoga Alliance has made public, from the 2016 Yoga in America study it ran with Yoga Journal, with data collected by Ipsos. It gives no dollar figure, and the teacher sample size is not published in the highlights. Yoga Alliance's newer 2022 survey publishes no income figure.
The lowest-paid 10% of fitness and yoga instructors earn under $28,800 a year; CorePower's posted pay starts at $15.63 an hour
Starting out drew 22 phrasings on our chart. BLS does not publish pay by experience, so these are the low end of the official range, the lowest posted chain rate, and what BLS says about certification.
BLS May 2025, employees only, personal trainers included. The lowest 25% earn under $35,280. These are the lowest earners at every stage, not only new ones.
Across 178 postings in 2026 the range is $15.63 to $25.00, with a median of $19.75. Teachers commit to at least two classes a week and are scheduled 30 minutes before and after each.
BLS says group fitness instructors may start without certification, but most get one for their kind of training, such as yoga. The 200-hour course and what it costs are covered in our guide How to become a yoga instructor.
Measured by us in October 2026, from Google's US suggestions. A row on teacher training cost was measured too, at 115 phrasings, and left off because it is about what training costs, not what teaching pays.
Yoga instructor pay questions
If you teach your own classes, take bookings and payment in the same step.
The free plan takes your first 100 bookings without a credit card. It is a permanent plan, not a trial.
- A class with a seat count, so the last mat is the last one booked
- A drop-in paid at booking, or a package of classes drawn down each booking, into your own Stripe account
- A private that recurs each week, charged each time with the customer's permission
- A video call link made automatically for each online class
Sources
Where every number on this page comes from, with the release or date we used.
- Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025: Exercise Trainers and Group Fitness Instructors (39-9031), national, state, metro and nonmetro areas, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2026-05-15 Employees only; the self-employed are not surveyed. Personal trainers, aerobics and yoga instructors are one occupation, with no yoga-only figure. The all-worker median of $50,980 is from the same file.
- Occupational Outlook Handbook: Fitness Trainers and Instructors, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2026-08-27 388,400 jobs in 2025, 15% of them self-employed; part-time schedules; certification of 200 and 500 hours. Its pay figures leave out the self-employed.
- SOC 2018 Definitions: 39-9031 Exercise Trainers and Group Fitness Instructors, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Lists Yoga Instructor as an illustrative example of the occupation.
- 2022 NAICS Index File, U.S. Census Bureau Indexes yoga fitness studios under 713940, with gyms and fitness centers, and yoga instruction under 611699.
- 2016 Yoga in America Study: teachers and practitioners highlights, Yoga Journal and Yoga Alliance January 2016. Data collected by Ipsos Public Affairs. "Only 29% of teachers report yoga as their primary source of income." No dollar income figure or teacher sample size in the highlights.
- CorePower Yoga teacher job postings, CorePower Yoga careers site, 2026-10-25 178 US teacher postings with a stated hourly rate, posted April to October 2026. The median and range are our arithmetic over the posted figures.
- Equinox yoga instructor job postings, Seattle and Chevy Chase, Maryland, Equinox job postings, 2026-01-06 The employer's posted pay-transparency line: $60 to $80 a class, $21.30 an hour for non-class work. The Chevy Chase posting, June 2026, lists $60 to $80 a class and $17.95 an hour. The posting pages expire, so there is no link.
- Ben Kalra, How Much Money I Make as a Full-Time Yoga Teacher, YouTube Upload date approximate, about 2023. Studio contractor in Charlotte, North Carolina. Gross figures in his own arithmetic, part observed and part a model month.
- Juliana Larochelle, How to Make Money as a Yoga Teacher Teaching In-Person Classes, YouTube Upload date approximate, about October 2025. Florida. She sells virtual yoga teacher trainings and class plans to teachers.
- Occupations that customarily and regularly received tips on or before Dec. 31, 2024, Internal Revenue Service, 2026-06-28 Entry 608: Exercise trainers and group fitness instructors, example titles aerobics trainer, yoga instructor, personal trainer; SOC 39-9031.
- Topic no. 761, Tips: withholding and reporting, Internal Revenue Service, 2026-10-12 The deduction of up to $25,000 of qualified tips for tax years 2025 through 2028.
- IRS Tax Tip 2026-06: How to take advantage of no tax on tips and overtime, Internal Revenue Service, 2026-01-26 The $25,000 cap, the phase-out above $150,000 ($300,000 joint) and the net-income limit for the self-employed.
- IR-2026-49: Treasury, IRS issue final regulations listing occupations where workers customarily and regularly receive tips, Internal Revenue Service, 2026-04-10 More than 70 occupations; qualified tips must be voluntary, not negotiated, and reported.
- 2020 ZCTA to County Relationship File, U.S. Census Bureau, 2021-12-09 Used by the ZIP tool to match a ZIP code to a county.
- 2020 Rural-Urban Commuting Area Codes, ZIP code file, USDA Economic Research Service Used by the ZIP tool to label an area urban core, suburban, small city or rural.
- Named teachers' and employers' own figures, Various Ben Kalra's studio rates and Equinox's posted pay, above
- Stripe pricing, standard US card rate, Stripe, 2026-10-25 the card processor kiwilaunch uses; quoted for the 3% card fee in the calculator
Not tax, legal or financial advice. Pay, rates and what you keep vary by state and city, whether a studio can treat you as a contractor is state law, and the tax rules on tips have conditions. A professional who knows your situation can answer for you.