The difference between Yoga Alliance Professionals and Yoga Alliance

Updated 10/05/2024

Trying to decide between Yoga Alliance Professionals and Yoga Alliance?

It's understandable that yoga teachers and schools believe that "all Yoga Alliances are the same". However, we, Yoga Alliance Professionals, are a unique organisation with a distinct mission, vision, and values that set us apart.

In this article, I'll explain the differences between our training standards. After all, you are likely making this comparison to gain accreditation. Comparing the membership benefits would be like comparing apples to oranges with how vastly different they are.

A Quick Overview

Course Hours

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• Foundation teacher training courses must have at least 180 contact hours so the students gain real-time knowledge and experience from their lead teacher.  This allows them to ask questions or raise concerns and allows the teacher to see if their students understand what is being taught.  
• Foundation teacher training courses require the lead teacher to teach, rather than simply present information in a pre-recorded format

Yoga Alliance

• Foundation teacher training course can have as low as 30 contact hours with the lead teacher. 
• Allows for 100% of classroom hours to be delivered via distance learning, with the requirement that 15% of the hours be in a live format.

Lead Teacher

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• Lead teacher must be accredited Senior Yoga Teacher (min. teaching over 8 years & 4,000 hours).
• At least one Senior Yoga Teacher must teach min 70% of allocated contact hours
• A Senior Yoga Teacher MUST be the lead teacher for ALL accredited training courses run by the school, whether that be teacher training or further training.
• Unlimited lead teachers - suitable for larger schools of yoga.

Yoga Alliance

• The lead teacher must be an E-RYT500 (500-hour, 4 years and 2,000 hours)
• The lead teacher must teach min 30 hours of the contact hours and 150 hours of the total 200 hours. 
• Up to 5 lead teachers.

Course Format

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• All Foundation courses must be taught over a period of at least 21 days. 
• We encourage all teacher training courses to be unique in their content. Yoga is a broad topic that encompasses many different teachings, styles, and practices. We encourage diversity and freedom, so not all training courses look or feel the same.
• We do not accredit self-paced courses as they go against our minimum contact hour criteria.

Yoga Alliance

• Allows for self-paced training courses.
• Has a standardised syllabus that all courses must follow.

Compliance Checks

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• Annual review of Trainer website & phone call check-in.
• Request feedback from graduates of accredited courses.

Yoga Alliance

• No compliance check

Registration Process

Yoga Alliance Professionals

We require a Zoom call to evaluate the ethics and values of trainers.  We evaluate their requirements for students accepted onto courses, as well as course content and final assessments.  We frequently reject applications for falling short of our standards and ethics.

Yoga Alliance

There is a standardised registration process that is pretty admin-heavy.

Additional Requirements

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• Additional requirements are in place for intensive courses and online courses to ensure sufficient knowledge is being passed on
• Students attending a 200-hour course must have at least 2 years of yoga practice so as not to hinder the rest of the class's progress.

Yoga Alliance

• No additional criteria

Teacher Levels

Yoga Alliance Professionals

• Yoga Teacher - min 200-hour certification (accepts non-accredited courses to be more inclusive)
• Experienced Yoga Teacher - min 4 years & 2000 hours of teaching experience*
• Senior Yoga Teacher - min 8 years & 4000 hours of teaching experience*

Yoga Alliance

• RYT 200 -  min 200-hour certificate from a registered Trainer
• RYT 500 - min 500-hour certificate from a registered Trainer
• E-RYT 200 - min 200-hour cert and 2 years teaching experience. They can be the lead teacher of a 200-hour training course until December 31, 2004.
• E-RYT 500 - min 500-hour cert & 4 years teaching experience. They can provide Continuing Education workshops & can be a lead teacher of a 200-hour or 500-hour teacher training.
• RCYT - min both 200-hour cert and a 95-hour children’s yoga training, registered with YA. 
• RPYT - min both a 200-hour cert and an 85-hour prenatal training, registered with YA