Have you ever wondered how many calories you can burn during a 30-60 minutes' yoga practice?

If you are running 10 minutes per mile for an hour, you will burn 566 calories. If you are jumping rope with 120 skips per minute, for an hour, you will burn 667 calories. Running up hills or stair sprints for an hour will burn 639 calories. So how about yoga?

According to HealthStatus.com, different types of yoga burns different amounts of calory. That too, depends on individuals' body weight, gender, heart rate, age and a few other aspects.

Here are the different types of yoga and the amount of calories you can burn by performing them:

Hatha Yoga

A practitioner of the traditional form of Hatha Yoga can burn 189 calories during a one-hour lesson.. This is because hatha yoga mostly focuses on holding poses for a longer duration and not just about burning calories, but increasing balance and stretching ability.

Ashtanga Yoga

A person can burn 351 calories during an hour of ashtanga practice. This system incorporates breathing and movement into a series of postures in a power-packed session. It contains some advanced poses performed in repetition.

Hot Yoga

This form of yoga, which is also known as Bikram yoga, is performed in a 37-40 degrees celcius setting. Practitioners can burn 477 calories for an hour of practice. Though it is one of the most popular form of yogas for weight loss, practitioners are not advised to perform it for a long period of time, due to concerns about dehydration. However, if you are looking for a quick way to lose weight, this may just be the type of yoga that suits you.

Vinyasa yoga

Vinyasa, or power yoga burns the highest amount of calories, per hour of practice. This form of yoga, which incorporates many types of yoga poses back to back, burns about 594 calories.

Surya Namaskar

Besides the different types of yoga, every set of sun salutation or Surya Namaskar, is also a great way to burn calories. Every set is capable of burning 14 calories. You can start with 5 sets, which can burn 70 calories, and slowly ramp it up to 12, 20 or more sets. A 12-set session can burn 168 calories, which is equivalent to a one-hour rigorous workout session at the gym.

A 30-minutes Surya Namaskar can burn 154 calories in a male weighing 70kg, while in a female weighing 60kg, it can burn a whopping 230 calories!

Besides burning calories, yoga is also a modern tool that helps improve flexibility, balance, strengthen the muscles, and gives peace of mind, increases immunity, among others.


Nizha Periaswamy is a yoga instructor and freelance writer

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