What should I charge for a yoga class?
Put in what a class costs you and what you want to earn. This works out your break-even price, a drop-in that gets you to your target, prices for packs and memberships, and what your time is really worth once prep and travel are counted.
Studio Ledger
Work it out from your own figures
Put in what a class costs you and what you want to earn. This works out the price that gets you there, what you'd keep at different attendance levels, and what your time is really worth once prep and travel are counted. Nothing is stored and nothing is sent anywhere.
Your floor
£0
Below this the class loses money at 8 people.
Suggested drop-in
£0
Covers your costs and your monthly target.
You've entered more people than the room holds. Raise the capacity, or check the average.
This looks like an attendance problem, not a pricing one.
What you'd actually earn
- Per class
- £0
- Per month
- £0
- Real hourly rate
- £0
What happens if attendance changes
Profit per class at £0 a head. Most classes vary more than teachers expect, so look at the low rows as well as the high ones.
Packs and membership
| Option | Price | You keep, per class |
|---|
Packs and memberships are paid for up front, whether or not every class gets used. That unused credit is real money, but it isn't counted anywhere above.
Every figure here comes from the numbers you entered — it isn't a recommendation, and it isn't based on what anyone else charges. Amounts are before income tax and National Insurance.
Start with what a class costs you
Most teachers price by looking sideways — at the studio in the next town, or at what they paid for a class themselves. It feels safer than picking a number, but it tells you nothing about whether your own classes pay.
Your costs are more useful, and there are fewer of them than you would think. The hall, getting there, and a share of the things that come out of your account every month whether you teach or not: insurance, a music licence, your website, your booking system. Spread those monthly costs across the classes you actually teach and you have the cost of putting one class on. Everything else follows from that.
Attendance moves the needle further than price
The hall costs the same whether six people come or twelve. So does your journey, and so does the hour you spent planning. That means almost everything an extra student pays goes straight to you, and an empty mat is money that cannot be recovered later.
This is why the strip showing profit at different attendance levels is the most useful part of the calculator, and why it is worth being hard on yourself about the average you enter. Put in your best week and every figure will flatter you. Take a few months of registers, add them up, divide, and use that instead — including the wet Tuesday in February when four people came.
If the tool tells you that filling the room would do more than raising the price, that is worth hearing before you send an email announcing a rise.
Count the hours nobody pays for
A sixty minute class is rarely sixty minutes of work. There is the planning, the driving, the setting out and putting away, and the messages you answer on a Sunday evening. None of it is billed, and all of it is time.
Dividing what you keep by the real hours gives you a rate you can compare with anything else you might do with the same afternoon. For a lot of teachers it is the number that finally makes the case for a rise — not because they were undercharging on purpose, but because nobody had ever added the unpaid part up.
Packs and memberships change the maths
A pack trades some income per class for money up front and a student who has already decided to come back. A monthly membership trades more of it for income you can count on. Both are reasonable, and the calculator shows what each leaves you per class so the trade is visible rather than assumed.
Watch the membership figure in particular. There is a number of monthly visits above which a member earns you less per class than a pack buyer would, and your most committed students are exactly the ones who pass it. That can still be a good deal for a full timetable — it just should not be a surprise.
One detail worth knowing: card fees are charged per payment, not per person. Twelve separate drop-ins pay the fixed part of the fee twelve times, where one pack pays it once. The calculator handles that, which is why pack yields come out slightly better than a straight discount would suggest.
What this cannot tell you
It cannot tell you what your students will pay. Every figure here comes from the numbers you entered, and none of it is based on what anyone else charges — there is no reliable published figure for that, and a made-up one would be worse than none. What it gives you is a floor you should not go below and a considered starting point above it.
Everything is also before income tax and National Insurance. Whatever the monthly figure says, some of it belongs to HMRC.
Once you've settled on your prices, something has to sell them. reservie takes drop-ins, class packs and monthly memberships, keeps track of how many credits each student has left, and collects the money without you chasing it. See what reservie costs.
Common questions
How do I work out what to charge for a yoga class?
Start with what one class costs you to put on — room hire, travel, and a share of the things you pay monthly like insurance and your booking system. Divide that by the number of people who honestly turn up, and you have your break-even price per head. Then add what you want the teaching to earn you each month, spread across the same people and classes. That gives you a price built on your own figures rather than on what the studio down the road charges.
Why does average attendance matter more than the price I set?
Because most of what a class costs you does not change with the number of people in the room. The hall costs the same whether six turn up or twelve, so every extra person is almost pure margin, and every empty mat is money you cannot get back. Going from six to nine students usually does more for your income than a pound on the door, and it costs your students nothing.
Should I include my unpaid time when pricing a class?
It will not change what you can charge, but it will change how you feel about the number. A one hour class is rarely one hour of work once you count planning, setting up, travelling and answering messages. Dividing what you keep by the real hours is the honest measure of what teaching pays you, and it is often the figure that convinces a teacher a rise is overdue.
How much discount should I give on a class pack?
There is no correct figure — it depends on what you are buying with it. A pack trades some income per class for money up front and a student who has already decided to come back. Ten to fifteen percent is a common starting point, and the calculator shows you what each level leaves you per class so you can decide whether the commitment is worth the discount.
Are memberships better than class packs?
They are steadier, not automatically better. A monthly unlimited membership gives you predictable income, but your keenest students may attend often enough that each class earns you less than a pack would have. The calculator shows the number of monthly visits where that crossover happens. Steady income can be worth it — the point is to choose it knowingly rather than find out later.
When should I raise my class prices?
A price rise is worth looking at when your costs have moved, when your real hourly rate has drifted below what you would accept, or when classes are consistently full. If your classes are half empty, a rise usually makes that worse — the calculator will tell you when filling the room would do more than raising the price. Give existing students notice, and let anyone on a pack finish it at the old rate.
Also useful: the class capacity & revenue calculator for how many mats fit your room, and the retreat profit calculator if you're pricing a residential.