The Ideal Yoga Clothes for Women

Having a plethora of choices for yoga clothes can be a blessing or a curse to women. On one hand, you have practically unlimited options in terms of style and design, so it’s impossible not to find yoga clothes that suit you perfectly. But on the other hand, having more options to choose from can also make shopping for yoga clothes a bit trickier. So just in case you’re having this same dilemma, here are our recommendations and tips to help you find the perfect yoga clothes.

Yoga Tops: Shirts, Tank Tops, and Midriff Tanks

Among these three types of clothing tops, it’s the midriff tanks or workout crop tops that are the least popular among women. Most women prefer still prefer to wear shirts and tank tops to their yoga classes. However, these workout midriff tops are recommended if you are doing Hot Yoga, where students are encouraged (but not required) to wear minimal clothing. For those who don’t know, Hot Yoga is a style of yogic practice that involves doing yoga exercises in a heated room.

So in addition to feeling the burn in your muscles, the warm external environment makes you sweat more and adds to your body heat. Minimal yoga clothing is advisable so heat can easily escape the body and let you cool down faster. A combination of cotton and lycra is still the best material for yoga tops because cotton effectively absorbs sweat, and the lycra provides the needed stretch in the material to allow unrestricted movement in doing yoga poses.

Between shirts and tank tops, the latter is a better choice for wider range of movement and ease with which the instructor can check the alignment of your upper body. Tops that have built-in padding or cups are also popular because bras can make you feel restricted and limit your movements.

Yoga Bottoms: Pants, Shorts, Skirts

If we are simply going by popularity, yoga pants hands-down wins when it comes to choosing yoga bottoms. However, it’s comfort and fit that will always rank highest in the list of factors to consider when shopping for yoga clothes. All three types are objectively comfortable to wear and are stretchable enough to allow you to do various yoga exercises, so it all boils down to your preference and which you are most comfortable wearing. The typical skirts worn for yoga are actually technically called “skorts” because they’re a combination of skirt and shorts.

There are different types of yoga pants to choose from: long, cropped (or capri), loose, tight, made of cotton and lycra or hemp, etc. For beginners, it’s better to go with tight-fitting cropped pants because it’s easier to check your leg angles and you eliminate the risk of tripping over loose leg bottoms when doing fast-paced styles of yoga exercise. As for shorts, women can choose between regular length ones and the micro shorts, which are typically body-hugging and fall just a couple inches below the butt.

Again, your choice of yoga bottoms will rely on what is most comfortable for you because you can find all three types made of the same stretchable and sweat-absorbent material. For Hot Yoga, we recommend shorts or micro shorts. For fast-paced styles of yoga like Ashtanga or Power Yoga, cropped pants, long straight-cut pants, shorts, or skirts are more ideal for beginners.

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of retail and online stores that sell yoga clothing for women. If you don’t have the time and/or energy to shop in retail stores, buying yoga clothes online is an excellent option. And because good yoga clothes are typically made of sweat-absorbent and stretchable material, you don’t have to worry about whether they will fit you just right. Aside from different colors and designs, yoga clothes for women are also available in a wide range of sizes – including plus sizes – so you won’t have a hard time finding the ideal yoga clothes that fit you to a T.