Cobra Pose (Bhujangasana)

Pronunciation and meaning

Bhujangasana: boo-jung-GAHS-uh-nuh. The stress falls on the third syllable, GAHS.

Bhujanga means serpent and asana means posture. The chest rises from the floor the way a cobra lifts its hood, while the legs stay long behind like its tail.

How to do Cobra Pose

1. Lie on your belly with your legs straight back, hip-width apart, and the tops of the feet pressing into the mat.
2. Place your hands flat under your shoulders, fingers pointing forward, and hug the elbows in against your ribs.
3. Press the pubic bone and the tops of the feet down, and reach the tailbone toward your heels to lengthen the lower back.
4. On an inhale, lift the forehead and then the chest, using the muscles of your back first and your hands only lightly.
5. Keep the elbows bent, the shoulders drawing down and back, and the neck long with the gaze forward or slightly down.
6. Hold for three to five breaths, then lower down slowly on an exhale and rest one cheek on the mat.

Make it easier

• Baby Cobra: stay low, with only the upper chest lifted and the lower ribs on the floor.
• Sphinx Pose: rest on your forearms with the elbows under the shoulders for a gentler, supported version.
• Place a folded blanket under the hips if the hip bones press uncomfortably into the floor.
• Widen the legs a little if the lower back pinches.

Pregnancy and after birth

Pregnancy. Avoid. Lying on the belly and pressing into it is not suitable during pregnancy. A gentle backbend on hands and knees, such as the Cow half of Cat-Cow, is a kinder substitute. Check with your OB or midwife before you start.

After birth. Adapt. Wait for your doctor or midwife to clear you, and longer after a caesarean birth. Begin with Sphinx or Baby Cobra, keep the lift small, and come down if you feel strain across the belly or the scar.

See prenatal yoga notes by trimester before you adapt a pose.

Common mistakes

• Straightening the arms and hanging in the lower back, which crunches the lumbar spine.
• Shrugging the shoulders up toward the ears.
• Cranking the head back to look at the ceiling.
• Letting the elbows flare out wide to the sides.
• Clenching the buttocks hard, which can pinch the lower back.

Cobra is often the first backbend people learn, and in a Vinyasa class it turns up inside the Sun Salutation. Done low and slow, it teaches the upper back to share a movement the lower back would happily take over on its own.

In Vinyasa yoga it helps to keep Cobra low at first, so the upper back learns its share before the chest rises any higher. To practise it inside the flow at a steady pace, try the timer that paces each Sun Salutation round.

When Cobra feels easy and the shoulders stay down, Upward-Facing Dog, the straight-arm version is the next step in a flow. Cobra opens the list of backbend yoga poses, from gentle to deep.

Holding the ankles and lifting the thighs too turns a belly-down backbend into Bow Pose, Dhanurasana. With the hands off the floor, the same back muscles do all the work in Locust Pose, the belly-down strengthener.

Which version of Cobra suits you today?

Where does Cobra come from?

Bhujangasana is described in the Gheranda Samhita, a hatha yoga manual usually dated to the seventeenth century, and it later became part of the Sun Salutation as that sequence spread in the twentieth century. Older forms of the pose tended to lift higher on straighter arms; many teachers today prefer the lower, bent-elbow version on this page because it spreads the backbend through the upper spine.

A short sequence that builds to Cobra

1. Cat-Cow, eight slow rounds, to warm the spine.
2. Sphinx, five breaths, forearms down.
3. Baby Cobra, three rounds of three breaths, lowering between rounds.
4. Locust with the arms by the sides, three breaths, for the back muscles.
5. Cobra, three to five breaths, at the height you can keep with the hands light.
6. Child’s Pose, one minute, knees wide.

Practise three or four times a week. Many people find the upper back starts to share the lift within a few weeks, and the pose feels less like a push from the hands.

Practising Cobra on a hard floor

On tile or a thin mat, the hip bones can press uncomfortably into the floor. A folded towel across the front of the hips helps. In humid weather, sweaty palms can slide back towards the hips mid-pose; keep a dry towel at the front of the mat and wipe the hands before you lift.