Yoga teacher training courses and qualifications

Before you formally begin your yoga journey, it’s useful to know if you have the right qualities. The best yoga instructors and teachers have strong communication and observation skills, sensitivity and empathy, a commitment to their own practice and expert knowledge about all that yoga encompasses.

If you feel that’s you to the letter, the first thing you’ll need to do is complete accredited yoga teacher training. This can be done one of two ways, either the face-to-face Level 3 Diploma in Teaching Yoga or the online yoga instructor course. Both are the same in terms of course content and support, it’s just a case of deciding how you’d like to complete your theory and practical assessments.

Alongside individual yoga courses, we also have a trio of career packages to choose from. These combine the entry-level yoga course with other qualifications such as Level 3 Exercise Referral and Level 3 Pre and Postnatal Exercise Instructor. It’s the perfect way to make a flying start with your yoga teaching career.

If you’re keen to discover more about the world of yoga, we’ve created a comprehensive guide to becoming a yoga teacher. Our career guides and articles also cover things like the history of yoga, essential books for yoga teachers and a look at yoga instructor jobs and opportunities.

We’re proud to be with partnered with some the UK’s most well-known and best-equipped clubs, gyms and leisure centres. This means we can deliver our yoga courses in the best environments possible.

For complete flexibility when it comes to your studies, we have over 10 venues across England, Scotland and Wales. Our most popular venues include London, Glasgow, Cardiff, Manchester, Leeds and Birmingham.

You can find a full list of where we deliver our courses by visiting our yoga teacher training course locations and venues page. There’s plenty of extra information here as well, including a break down of each venue’s facilities and a route planner.

If you’ve enrolled onto any of our yoga courses, it’s important to note that it’s not a matter of how quickly you complete your teacher training, but how well you grasped the content and how confident you feel to teach.

Our Essentials yoga career package, which is comprised of our Level 3 Yoga Teacher Training, can be completed in 10-12 weeks. The Specialist package, which combines yoga and the Level 3 Pre and Postnatal Instructor course, takes approximately 12-16 weeks to qualify. Finally, there’s the Advanced career package which brings together the yoga instructor course and the Level 3 Exercise Referral Diploma (including Level 3 Nutrition for Physical Activity) and this takes approximately 16-18 weeks to complete.

Our yoga courses and teacher training utilise the blended learning model and we believe this offers aspiring yogis the most flexibility with their studies. Essentially, this involves a period of home study combined with practical weekend attendance at one of our nationwide venues.

To ensure you’ll have guidance at every stage of your journey, as soon as you enrol you’ll be assigned a dedicated Learner Support Tutor. Your tutor is an expert in all things yoga and they’ll be on hand Monday – Friday via phone or email to answer all your questions.

Alongside tutor support, you’ll also have access to LES, Learner Engagement System. This easy-to-use online platform is available 24/7 and it’s where you’ll find a range of resources to further your learning. These include mock quizzes, workbooks, video lectures delivered by experts and step-by-step video demonstrations of a range of asanas (yoga poses).

The online resources are used in conjunction with our bespoke training manuals and they are available in print and digitally via the HFE app. Take a look at our yoga teacher sample manual to get a real feel for the quality you can expect.

We get asked this question all the time as it is often a thing other training providers claim to offer. While it may suit some, this doesn’t fit with our ‘become more’ ethos. It’s our job to train you to be the best yoga teacher or instructor you possibly can be and feel confident enough that you can go out into the world and teach whoever and wherever you want.

Firstly, it’s why our yoga courses are accredited by YMCA Awards and recognised by CIMSPA. It’s these stamps of approval that you mean you could potentially walk into any gym, health club or yoga studio in the world and secure work.

We’ve found that instilling this attitude, that you can teach anywhere, has inspired our students and graduates to do some amazing things, including starting the internationally-renowned YogaFit Retreats, opening their own studios and much more.

Instead of claiming we can guarantee an interview or get you a job, we’ve created CV Connect. As soon as you’ve completed your yoga instructor course, you’ll gain access to this innovative platform. We’ve personally sourced hundreds of employers and a thousand active vacancies.

To connect with them, all you need to do is upload your CV, select employers in your area and hit send. If any of the employers you’ve contacted like what they see, they’ll be in touch with directly – no hidden fees, no recruitment agencies, just a simple connection to a potentially life-changing career move.

If you’re interested in learning more about employment in the yoga world, we’ve created an article specifically about yoga instructor jobs and opportunities that is very much worth your time.

If you’re certain that yoga teacher training is the right career move for you, why let anything stand in the way?

We treat all our aspiring yogis the same. There are no special discounts because you’ve booked before a certain date, no flash sales or anything like that, just a transparent and open pricing model.

For those in a position to sort everything upfront, we can offer you a 5% discount if you pay for your yoga instructor course or career package in full.

Spreading the cost is also something you’re able to do. We have 0% 6-month and 12-month payment plans available and you can secure your place with a small deposit.

For serving personnel or service leavers, select yoga courses and career packages have also been military approved. If this applies to you, please contact our Careers Team on 0800 612 4067 to learn more about the MOD’s Enhanced Learning Credits Scheme (ELCAS).

Ideally, prior to enrolling on your course you’ll have some experience of attending yoga classes as a participant. So, you should already have a few hours of yoga practice under your belt.

If you’ve never attended a yoga class or session, then it’s no major problem, but you will need to take a little longer with your course so that you have time to go to some classes and get some physical practice behind you.

Throughout your course, you’ll need to evidence at least 60 hours of yoga practice in a dedicated journal. On enrolment, you’ll receive a printed yoga journal to support you with this task. In reality, most students clock up more than the required 60 hours throughout their course, not least because self-practice also counts.

Our Level 3 Diploma in Teaching Yoga is regulated by Ofqual and is the only regulated yoga qualification in the UK. It is certificated by YMCA Awards, recognised by the Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity (CIMSPA) and is recognised the world over as a credible and reputable yoga teaching qualification.

In yoga, there are membership organisations, like Yoga Alliance for example, who have their own endorsement pathways for training courses (which aren’t qualifications). Here at HFE, we specialise in delivering regulated qualifications that maximise the employment opportunities of our gradates, so we don’t tend to affiliate with non-regulated organisations. We acknowledge some of these organisations are credible, but their lack of regulation is not something we support.