Holding asanas in a heated class can be tricky, especially when you’re dealing with clingy clothes and sweat stinging your eyes—which is why using the best mat for hot yoga is essential to keeping you stable and safe. The ideal pick will help you feel “zoned in on your practice to the point where you’re not focusing on your mat,” Erin Archibald, a registered yoga instructor formerly with CorePower Yoga in Denver, tells SELF.
But shopping for a mat that doesn’t slip or bunch up as you move and perspire isn’t as simple as grabbing the first option you find. To help you track down the right hot yoga mat for your practice, we spoke with instructors, trainers, and SELF staffers. Shop our firm, supportive, and highly grippy favorites below.
Our top picks
- Best Overall: Lululemon The Mat 5mm, $98
- Most Cushioned: Manduka Pro, $138
- Grippiest: JadeYoga Harmony Mat, $92
- Best Budget Pick: Gaiam Cork Yoga Exercise Mat, $32
- Best for Heavy Sweaters: Manduka GRP Adapt Yoga Mat 5mm, $94
- Best for Travel: Manduka eKO Superlite Travel Yoga Mat, $52
- Most Durable: JadeYoga Elite S Mat, $130
- Best for Alignment: Liforme Yoga Mat, $150
Shop the best hot yoga mats
Feel more confident in class with one of these expert-approved mats underneath your feet.
Best Overall: Lululemon The Mat 5mm
A favorite among many of the experts we spoke to, this 2022 SELF Home Fitness Award winner has a rubber base and a grippy top layer to keep you grounded. Plus, it’s sweat-absorbing: “I always feel very stable and rooted when I’m practicing on a Lulu mat,” says Archibald, who has been using hers for years.
If you alternate between vinyasa and hot yoga, you’ll love The Mat’s reversible design—you can choose to use the high-traction side or the more cushioned side, depending on the class you’re in. It’s even sturdy enough for other activities, like HIIT workouts, Sarah Larson Levey, a registered yoga instructor and cofounder of Y7 Studio in New York City, tells SELF. That makes it a great pick for yogis who want the most bang for their buck too.
Need a thinner surface for even more stability? There’s also a 3mm option available.
Dimensions: 26 x 71 inches | Thickness: 5 millimeters | Weight: 5.24 pounds
Most Cushioned: Manduka Pro
This SELF Home Fitness Award–winning mat comes in two sizes and is “very grippy, supportive, and stable,” Archibald says. The closed-cell construction seals out moisture and bacteria, making it easy to wipe down and disinfect.
Slightly thicker than Lululemon’s The Mat at six millimeters, the Manduka Pro is great for folks wanting extra cushioning for their joints. And if the slightly higher price point makes you hesitate, it could be worth the investment if you flow on a regular basis—the Manduka Pro comes with a lifetime guarantee.
Dimensions: 26 x 71 or 26 x 85 inches | Thickness: 6 millimeters | Weight: 7.5 or 9.5 pounds
Grippiest: JadeYoga Harmony Mat
While all of the mats on this list have good traction, the Harmony Mat has a unique texture that our experts confirm sets it apart from the pack. Described by Levey as “wonderful,” this natural rubber mat provides plenty of cushioning. Archibald finds it to be very grippy and incredibly supportive, and she likes the porous, sweat-absorbing surface. It provides a “grittier” feel compared to other mats, she says, which can increase the mat’s friction.
The one downside: It can be tricky to clean. “It’s definitely not something that you can just wipe down with a towel,” Levey says. To thoroughly sanitize it, she recommends using JadeYoga’s mat cleaner.
Dimensions: 24 x 68 inches | Thickness: 4.70 millimeters | Weight: 5 pounds
Best Budget Pick: Gaiam Cork Yoga Exercise Mat
Gaiam
Cork Yoga Exercise Mat
“Cork is a natural and non-slip surface that responds even better when wet, which means you’re safe to sweat,” Talon Jacquelyn, a registered yoga teacher and meditation coach at Talon J Yoga, tells SELF. “It dries quickly too.”
This super lightweight, sub-$50 cork yoga mat from Gaiam is five millimeters thick with a base coated in thermoplastic elastomer (TPE), so it won’t shift around on the floor underneath you. One thing to note is that cork has a firmer feel than rubber, so if you prefer an ultra-cushy mat, this might not be the best option for you.
Dimensions: 24 x 68 inches | Thickness: 5 millimeters | Weight: 1.76 pounds
Best for Heavy Sweaters: Manduka GRP Adapt Yoga Mat 5mm
Manduka
GRP Adapt Yoga Mat 5mm
This high-quality Manduka mat wins points from Jacquelyn for being “extremely sturdy,” no matter how much you sweat. The material allows moisture to pass through the top layer of the mat to the foam interior, making it majorly absorbent. “On most yoga mats, my hands slip in a hot class. My Manduka mat has a great grip that helps me stay stable from downward facing dog to handstands and beyond,” Mallory Fox, MS, DHSc, a NASM-certified master trainer, tells SELF.
Sara Coughlin, SELF’s senior commerce writer, has and loves this yoga mat for sweaty sessions (“which,” she says, “for me, is most sessions”), especially ones that involve a lot of floor poses. It’s extremely well-padded for how sturdy and supportive it is, which helps her feel grounded yet comfy when she pushes up into wheel pose.
Dimensions: 26 x 71 or 26 x 79 inches | Thickness: 5 millimeters | Weight: 5.5 or 7 pounds
Best for Travel: Manduka eKO Superlite Travel Yoga Mat
Manduka
eKO Superlite Travel Yoga Mat
Manduka’s ultra-thin travel mat will help you stretch out and recharge after cramped flights and drives. It folds down to a tidy rectangle, so you don’t have to wrestle a rolled-up mat into your duffel. “I cannot believe how easily this mat packs away,” Coughlin says. “I can slip it into pretty much any carry-on or weekender, and basically forget it’s there until I want to break it out for a hotel room flow.”
A lot of travel yoga mats sacrifice quality for portability. But the eKO Superlite has the same grippy feel as Manduka’s standard mats, so you can enjoy the same quality of practice even when you’re far from home.
Dimensions: 24 x 71 or 24 x 79 inches | Thickness: 1.50 millimeters | Weight: 2 or 2.5 pounds
Most Durable: JadeYoga Elite S Mat
JadeYoga’s textured Elite S mat holds up— Jacquelyn says it lives up to the hype, especially for hot yoga (it has a similar feel to the Jade Harmony). “The Jade grip is truly the best in the business, and this mat is built to last through years of rigorous practice,” she says.
A dense top layer adds firmness and protects against scuffs, making the Elite S a great choice for flowing practices with lots of transitions or mat workouts like Pilates. Jacquelyn also likes supporting JadeYoga for their sustainability efforts: The company plants a tree for every mat purchased.
Dimensions: 24 x 71 inches | Thickness: 4.8 millimeters | Weight: 5 pounds
Best for Alignment: Liforme Yoga Mat
This mat is a bigger investment, but Darlene Marshall, NASM-CWC, a certified wellness coach and personal trainer who also has a 200-hour yoga teacher training (YTT) certification, tells SELF that it’s worth the cost. “I finally invested in one and I’ll never go back,” she says. “It’s grippy and absorbent, so I didn’t slide, even when I forgot my towel.”
Liforme’s calling card is its alignment system—basically, a series of markings on the mat that help you understand where to place your hands and feet. Marshall says following this diagram through her flows has been a wonderful way to enhance her practice.
Dimensions: 27 x 73 inches | Thickness: 4.20 millimeters | Weight: 5.51 pounds
How to choose a hot yoga mat
A grippy mat will reduce your chances of slipping and sliding as things get hot and sweaty in class. Look for rubber options, says Archibald—natural rubber (over synthetic) tends to be higher quality. Cork is also a naturally grippy material.
Porous mats with an open-cell design can better absorb your sweat and won’t create puddles or a slipping hazard, Archibald says. Many open-cell mats are made from natural rubber.
Just keep in mind: You’ll want to regularly clean them, so they don’t get stinky. If you prefer an option that’s easier to sanitize, go for a closed-cell, nonporous design that can be wiped down, Levey says. With these mats, you may also want to use a yoga towel for extra traction (we’ve included some of our favorites below).
Yoga mats come in a wide range of thicknesses, and the right amount of padding boils down to your personal preference. You might feel more stable during balancing poses on a thinner mat, while a thicker one will provide more cushion for your joints. Generally, Archibald recommends a thinner option (three to five millimeters tall) for hot yoga for a more grounded feeling, and a thicker mat (above five millimeters) for slower-paced styles like yin or restorative yoga.
Standard yoga mats are 26 by 71 inches, which works well for most folks, Archibald says. If you’re taller (say, over six foot two), then you may feel more comfortable on a wider, longer version, Levey says.
Yoga mats are difficult to recycle, so it’s important to look for one that can last you for several years of practice, Jacquelyn says. As you browse, look for reviews from shoppers that speak to the mat’s longevity.
How we picked the best hot yoga mats
We spoke to a range of yoga instructors and personal trainers to narrow down our list of top picks. We also looked back through previous years’ Home Fitness Award winners to see which mats impressed our testers with their grip and support (two key features for extra-sweaty practices). Finally, we considered favorites among the SELF staff, some of whom have personal training or 200-hour YTT certifications of their own. The result is the tightly curated list above, solely featuring yoga mats that’ll hold up to lots of use, even when the heat is on.
Other equipment that’s useful for hot yoga
Your yoga practice and gear can be as simple or souped up as you want it to be. You might want a set of yoga blocks to help you maintain proper alignment or modify poses, straps to help you get into your stretches or deepen them, and bolsters to support your knees or hips. Another nice-to-have: a yoga mat bag or carrying strap (if your mat doesn’t come with one), to make heading to and from class a little easier.
Best hot yoga towels
If you know you’re going to break a sweat, bring a towel to wipe your hands, face, and mat during class. You don’t need anything special, though. “To be truthful, mat towels are not a necessity when you buy a mat already built to withstand sweat,” says Jacquelyn. “But when I do use a towel in yoga, I opt for small hand towels in a heated vinyasa session or big beach towels in a true hot yoga (Bikram) class. These are likely towels you already have on hand, so start there!”
Want something you can use just for yoga? Here are Jacquelyn’s recommendations.
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Size: 16 x 26.5 inches
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Manduka
eQua Yoga Hand Towel
You can place this lightweight microfiber towel near your mat to keep sweaty hands at bay or lay it on your mat under your face to catch any drips. “It’s easy to throw in a yoga bag and dries quickly, so I end up using it for up to three to four sessions,” says Jacquelyn. “It’s great for wiping your face or even covering your eyes in savasana!”
Size: 16 x 26.5 inches
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Size: 24 x 71 inches
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Manduka
Yogitoes Yoga Mat Towel
A large, mat-sized towel like this one (with a textured bottom) can transform a regular yoga mat into a grippy hot yoga mat. It’ll also help absorb moisture during seriously heated classes. “This is the towel I use for super sweaty Bikram yoga sessions,” says Jacquelyn. “I’ve had the same pink Yogitoes for over 13 years and it still works perfectly. I trust the brand and love the anti-slip silicone nubs!”
Size: 24 x 71 inches
Additional reporting by Jenny McCoy, C.P.T., and Jessica Kasparian
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