Cobra Poseभुजंगासन
Bhujaṅgāsana — a beginner backbend that works the spinal erectors, glutes, chest.
15–30SECONDS HELD
One line on the timetable. Cobra Pose is held 15–30 seconds, 2–3 rounds, breathing as follows: inhale to lift, exhale to lower — and it takes its place inside 5 of the practices posted on this site.
SOURCE·YogaPath sequence data — stay times as taught·one breath ≈ 5 s at an even pace·REVIEWED JUL 2026
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How to do Cobra Pose
Read all of it before starting, and read the cautions further down before starting at all.
Lie face down with the legs straight, the tops of the feet on the mat and the forehead resting down.
Place the hands under the shoulders with the elbows tucked close to the ribs.
Press the pubic bone and the fronts of the thighs into the floor so the pelvis stays anchored.
Peel the chest off the mat on an inhale, keeping the elbows bent and most of the lift coming from the back muscles.
Draw the shoulders away from the ears, look forward, hold, then lower slowly on an exhale.
Hold: 15–30 seconds, 2–3 rounds. Breath: Inhale to lift, exhale to lower.
Muscles worked
Where the effort and the lengthening land. Primary groups do most of the work; secondary groups assist or are stretched.
What Cobra Pose does
Described mechanically — what the movement does to muscle and joint. Not a list of conditions it treats, because a pose does not treat conditions.
- Extends the thoracic spine against gravity with the pelvis fixed to the floor.
- Strengthens the spinal erectors, since the lift is muscular rather than pushed up by the arms.
- Lengthens the abdominal wall and the front of the chest.
Cobra Pose is one of 43 backbends in this library and one of 88 poses rated beginner. Poses that extend the spine and open the front of the body — chest, hip flexors and abdomen.
Who should skip Cobra Pose, or change it
- Pregnancy from the second trimester onward — this is a prone pose and puts weight on the belly; use a standing back arch instead.
- Disc injury or spondylolisthesis, where repeated lumbar extension is not advised — take Sphinx with the forearms low.
- Recent abdominal or hernia surgery.
- Wrist injury: keep the hands wide and the elbows down so the arms carry almost no weight.
- Carpal tunnel pain — practise the arm-free version with the hands off the mat.
General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts. If you are pregnant, recovering from surgery or managing any health condition, ask your doctor before starting a practice, and learn the pose itself from a qualified teacher who can see you move.
Common mistakes in Cobra Pose
What tends to go wrong, and the specific correction — not "engage your core".
MistakePushing the arms straight so the whole bend collects in a short stretch of the lower back.
FixKeep the elbows bent and lift only as high as the back muscles alone can hold.
MistakeShoulders riding up towards the ears and the neck cranking back.
FixSlide the shoulder blades down the back and keep the throat long with the gaze forward.
How the energy figure on a yoga timetable is reached
- Nobody has measured a single asana in a metabolic cart, so no per-pose figure is published here — not by this site and not by anyone.
- The pose is matched to the nearest style of practice in the 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities. Cobra Pose sits at code 02150, yoga, Hatha, 2.5 MET.
- That MET value is put through the standard ACSM relationship for a stated reference adult of 70 kg.
- The result is the cost of a practice of that kind for as long as you practise — not the cost of holding this one shape.
- Scale it to yourself: the relationship is linear in body mass, so multiply by your own weight in kilograms and divide by 70.
kcal/min = MET × 3.5 × kg ÷ 200
= 2.5 × 3.5 × 70 ÷ 200
= 3.06 kcal per minute
The same practice, hour by hour
Read it the way you would read a timetable: pick the length of session you actually sit down for, and that is the figure.
| Time practising | 10 min | 20 min | 30 min | 45 min | 60 min |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 31 | 61 | 92 | 138 | 184 |
SOURCE·2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities·code 02150 · 2.5 MET · 70 kg reference adult·REVIEWED JUL 2026
The whole activity dataset, including everything that is not yoga, is at BurnLab.
Asked before class
How do you do Cobra Pose?
Lie face down with the legs straight, the tops of the feet on the mat and the forehead resting down. Place the hands under the shoulders with the elbows tucked close to the ribs. Press the pubic bone and the fronts of the thighs into the floor so the pelvis stays anchored. Peel the chest off the mat on an inhale, keeping the elbows bent and most of the lift coming from the back muscles. Draw the shoulders away from the ears, look forward, hold, then lower slowly on an exhale. Hold for 15–30 seconds, 2–3 rounds.
What does Cobra Pose work?
Primarily the spinal erectors, glutes, chest, with the shoulders, rhomboids, abdominals assisting or lengthening. In mechanical terms: extends the thoracic spine against gravity with the pelvis fixed to the floor.
Who should not do Cobra Pose?
Pregnancy from the second trimester onward — this is a prone pose and puts weight on the belly; use a standing back arch instead. Disc injury or spondylolisthesis, where repeated lumbar extension is not advised — take Sphinx with the forearms low. Recent abdominal or hernia surgery. Wrist injury: keep the hands wide and the elbows down so the arms carry almost no weight. Carpal tunnel pain — practise the arm-free version with the hands off the mat. This is general information, not medical advice — if any of these apply to you, ask your doctor and learn the pose with a qualified teacher rather than from a page.
Is Cobra Pose suitable for beginners?
Yes. Cobra Pose is a beginner-level pose on this site, which means it is learnable in a first class and has a version that works for most bodies. The cautions above still apply.
How many calories does Cobra Pose burn?
The honest answer is that nobody has measured a single asana. The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities publishes MET values for styles of yoga, not for individual poses. Cobra Pose sits closest to Compendium code 02150, yoga, Hatha, at 2.5 MET — about 92 kcal for 30 minutes of that kind of practice for a 70 kg adult. Holding one pose for a minute is a rounding error either way.
The rest of the backbends on the wall
More backbends — first at the same level, then the rest of the family.
The pose photograph on this page is an AI-generated illustration of Geeta Patel. Geeta is a synthetic model: not a real teacher, not a real person, and nothing here is her opinion. It was checked against the alignment steps on this page before publishing, and it is not a record of anyone’s practice.
Asana names are traditional. Every step, benefit and caution on this page is written for YogaPath rather than reproduced from any book, studio or other library — see how this site is written and what it is written from. General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts.
SOURCE·Published asana references·asana names, alignment and cautions as taught·REVIEWED JUL 2026
