Rooster Poseकुक्कुटासन
Kukkuṭāsana — an advanced balance pose that works the shoulders, triceps, abdominals.
3–6BREATHS HELD
One line on the timetable. Rooster Pose is held 3–6 breaths, with the breath moving throughout — and no set practice here is built around it — it is held on its own.
SOURCE·YogaPath sequence data — stay times as taught·one breath ≈ 5 s at an even pace·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How to do Rooster Pose
Read all of it before starting, and read the cautions further down before starting at all.
Sit in a comfortable full lotus with both feet high on the opposite thighs.
Thread the right hand down through the gap between the right calf and thigh, then the left hand on the left side.
Work each arm through until the forearms are clear and the palms can sit flat on the floor.
Spread the fingers, press down hard and lift the whole lotus off the mat.
Hold with the chest lifted for a few breaths, then lower and change which leg is on top.
Hold: 3–6 breaths. Keep the breath moving throughout — if you are holding it, the pose is too much for today.
Muscles worked
Where the effort and the lengthening land. Primary groups do most of the work; secondary groups assist or are stretched.
What Rooster 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.
- Lifts the entire body on the hands from a seated position, loading the shoulders and triceps directly.
- Requires the hip flexors and abdominals to hold the folded legs up and clear of the floor.
- Puts the wrists and forearms under a straight-down pressing load.
Rooster Pose is one of 31 balance poses in this library and one of 61 poses rated advanced. Poses held on a reduced base — one foot, two hands, or the forearms.
Who should skip Rooster Pose, or change it
- Wrist injury or carpal tunnel syndrome.
- Knee injury — threading the arms through a lotus puts sideways pressure on the joint.
- Shoulder or elbow injury.
- Pregnancy and recent abdominal surgery.
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 Rooster Pose
What tends to go wrong, and the specific correction — not "engage your core".
MistakeForcing the arms through a tight lotus and levering the knees.
FixStop if the knee speaks at all; the arms only fit when the lotus is genuinely easy.
MistakeShoulders hunching up to the ears on the lift.
FixPush the floor away and let the collarbones stay broad.
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. Rooster Pose sits at code 02175, yoga, Power, 4 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
= 4 × 3.5 × 70 ÷ 200
= 4.90 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 | 49 | 98 | 147 | 221 | 294 |
SOURCE·2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities·code 02175 · 4 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 Rooster Pose?
Sit in a comfortable full lotus with both feet high on the opposite thighs. Thread the right hand down through the gap between the right calf and thigh, then the left hand on the left side. Work each arm through until the forearms are clear and the palms can sit flat on the floor. Spread the fingers, press down hard and lift the whole lotus off the mat. Hold with the chest lifted for a few breaths, then lower and change which leg is on top. Hold for 3–6 breaths.
What does Rooster Pose work?
Primarily the shoulders, triceps, abdominals, with the wrists, forearms, hip flexors assisting or lengthening. In mechanical terms: lifts the entire body on the hands from a seated position, loading the shoulders and triceps directly.
Who should not do Rooster Pose?
Wrist injury or carpal tunnel syndrome. Knee injury — threading the arms through a lotus puts sideways pressure on the joint. Shoulder or elbow injury. Pregnancy and recent abdominal surgery. 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 Rooster Pose suitable for beginners?
No. Rooster Pose is rated advanced. The shape itself is rarely the problem — arriving at it years too early is. Work through the beginner and intermediate balance poses on this site and learn this one in person.
How many calories does Rooster 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. Rooster Pose sits closest to Compendium code 02175, yoga, Power, at 4 MET — about 147 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 balance poses on the wall
More balance poses — first at the same level, then the rest of the family.
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
The people behind these sites
Follow the build
This site and nine others like it are built and photographed by two people: Amit Sharma — behind the build; Geeta Patel — the poses, demonstrated. New work goes up on Instagram and Facebook before it reaches a page here.
Amit Sharma
@amitsharmaofficial
Instagram
Geeta Patel
@geetapatelnz
Instagram
Geeta Patel
GeetaPatelYoga
Facebook
Following changes nothing here — every page stays open, with no account and no wall.
