Yoga pose for bloat — it’s one of the simplest and most effective tools to ease digestive discomfort. Whether you’re dealing with a mild “food baby” or a more extreme, distended belly that leaves you feeling nine months pregnant, bloating is never fun. It can leave you feeling heavy, lethargic, and even self-conscious.
If bloating is something you experience often, it’s more than just an inconvenience—it’s a sign that your digestive system may be in distress. Recurring bloating can point to underlying issues like poor gut function, sluggish elimination, or inflammation. While it’s important to review your overall diet and lifestyle, incorporating targeted yoga poses can help move things along and provide almost immediate relief.
Why Use Yoga for Bloating?
Certain yoga poses gently compress and twist the abdomen, stimulating digestive organs, relieving trapped gas, and encouraging bowel movements. With consistent practice, these movements can help strengthen your core, support detoxification, and promote better long-term digestive health.
TRAINING TYPE: FLOW SEQUENCE
CATEGORY:YOGA
SUBCATEGORY:BEGINNER YOGA
PLANNED TIME:10 MIN
LEVEL:BEGINNER
PROPS:NONE
Why to try a yoga pose for bloat and discomfort
If you’re searching for a yoga pose for bloat relief, you’re in the right place. Yoga’s twisting and compressive postures help stimulate digestion and keep your bowels moving, which is essential for clearing out excess gas and toxins. By practicing the right yoga poses regularly, you can support a clean, spacious digestive tract and let stagnant energies flow freely downward and out of the body.
Why Choose a Yoga Pose for Bloat Treatment?
Bloating often signals that something is obstructing your digestive system—whether it’s slow transit time, poor gut health, or inflammation. This obstruction can lead to toxicity buildup, making you feel lethargic and mentally foggy.
Using a yoga pose for bloat treatment helps by:
- Massaging and compressing the abdominal organs to encourage movement.
- Stimulating peristalsis (the natural wave-like motion in your intestines).
- Supporting detoxification through improved circulation.
- Strengthening your core and digestive muscles for better long-term function.
Yoga Poses For Bloating Infographic
Poses To Help Relieve Bloating
Wide Legged Child’s Pose – Balasana
Walk your knees to the outside edges of the mat, bring the big toes to touch, and come down into a Wide Legged Child’s Pose. Walk your hands forward, continuing to lengthen the spine as you lower down towards the mat, melt the hips down towards your heels. You can connect your forehead to the ground and actively press into the palms, and this will help sink your hips closer towards your heels.Having the knees wide here allows us to create space so the belly can breathe in and out with restriction. This can help with any uncomfortability caused by bloating by giving the belly some extra room.
Cat-Cow Pose – Marjaryasana-Bitilasana
Move into a table top position, stacking the shoulders over the wrists and hips over the knees. Starting in Cow Pose, drop the belly down and send the tailbone up towards the sky. Lift the chest forward, sending the heart out, allowing the gaze to go slightly up, but still lengthening the back of the neck. Inhale, and starting from the base of the spine, begin to tuck the tailbone under, rounding the spine vertebrae by vertebrae. Really push the spine up towards the sky and draw the chin down towards the chest, exhale out your air. Inhale for Cow Pose, heart goes up and out. And then exhale, rounding the spine for Cat Pose.As you breathe through your Cat-Cow Postures, find expansion in the belly and visualise the bloating stretching its way out of the body. These alternating movements of lengthening and contracting the core is going to help pump the stomach and encourage movement and more space.
Downward Facing Dog – Adho Mukha Svanasana
Start to lift the hips high to come into a Downward Facing Dog. Spread all ten fingers wide on the mat and press down into the heels of the palms and this will naturally send your tailbone up towards the sky. Drop the heels down towards the mat and find a nice inverted V shape with the body. Make sure to take big breaths in and full exhalations out. Enjoy this unrestricted breath here as the belly expands and works to remove all that bloated discomfort.
Standing Forward Bend – Uttanasana
Make sure the feet are about hip distance apart and place a soft bend in the knees. Place the hands down to the mat. Release your head and your neck and allow yourself to hang heavy. Send the weight into your toes but continue to root down through the heels. Start to straighten the legs and send your tailbone up towards the sky to lengthen the spine. Let each exhale bring you deeper. There is the option to grab opposite elbows and allow the natural weight of the body to carry you down.This posture creates compression in the stomach which is going to help massage the organs and remove bloating. Send your awareness into the belly and visualise waking up the organs, by taking big breaths in and full exhales out.
Tip Toe Pose Variation – Prapadasana
Come down into a crouching position and up onto the tips of the toes. Lift the heels up off the earth and the have the fingertips down for balance. This posture creates a nice compression inside the belly. There is the option to challenge the balance further, by wrapping one arm, maybe both, around your knees. Pick one point to focus on to help with balance and try to come up higher on the toes. This posture is a great way to compress the stomach by curling up into the smallest ball that you can and dropping the head down towards the knees. Simultaneously you are stretching into the feet and challenging balance.
Half Lord of the Fishes Pose Variation – Ardha Matsyendrasana
Take a seat and extend the legs straight along the mat. Bend your right knee and step your right foot over the left leg. Scoop the hands up towards the sky as you inhale and then drop the right hand down towards the back of your mat, and wrap the left arm around the right knee, exhaling as you twist. Press into your right palm to lengthen the spine and as you exhale finding a little bit more depth in the twist. Take this twist to the other side. Another great posture for compressing and twisting the belly, by cutting off circulation so that when you release the pose there is a fresh rush of blood into the problem area, which can assist in pumping obstruction out. Twists are great because they help to move the organs which aids in removing indigestion and bloating.
Seated Forward Bend Pose – Paschimottanasana
Sit up tall with a straight spine and remove any extra flesh from underneath the sitting bones. Sweep the hands up towards the sky, inhale to lengthen the spine and then start to reach the hands towards the feet. Keep the head in line with the spine and then slowly exhale coming into a Seated Forward Fold. With every breath there is the opportunity to continue to lengthen through the spine, and with every exhale try to fold a little bit deeper. As this posture compresses the belly and helps to remove boating, it also lengthens the entire back side of the body from the heels through to the crown of the head.
Featured Video: 7 Relief Yoga Poses For Bloating
Conclusion
Bloating is not a normal part of eating, even though so many have chalked it up as a standard consequence of enjoying food. Of course, if we overeat or ignore some of the rules of proper food combining, we may suffer from bloating, but regular bloating is a sign that the digestive system is in need of a clean—and yoga poses for bloat can definitely help aid this process!
This article has equipped you with the means to twist, compress, and detoxify your belly through effective yoga poses for bloat. Use these postures daily to help keep your body in a state of fluidity and keep excess gas at bay. When you consistently work into the core with these poses, you will build strength and resilience in your digestive tract, helping to reduce the severity of bloating.
However, it’s also recommended to take other measures such as cleaning up your diet, supporting your colon health, and reducing stress—because all these factors play vital roles in digestive health and overall wellbeing.
About
Charlie Hanna
Charlie is a Yoga Alliance certified Hatha, Yin Yoga & Meditation teacher with a psychology degree in her back pocket. She is currently on a mission, chasing sun and Read More..
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