Yoga matched strengthening exercise for knee pain at 12 weeks; smaller trials found benefits for stiffness and chair rises, with limits to lasting effects.
Getting up from a chair can begin with a hand on the knee and a pause. At the station stairs, you may check how the knee feels before taking the next step. For someone living with knee osteoarthritis, the useful question about yoga is often whether these ordinary movements might feel less burdensome, rather than whether a pose looks impressive.
A small randomized controlled trial involving 36 women, with an average age of 72, offers an encouraging starting point. After 8 weeks of yoga combining group sessions with home practice, participants showed improvements in knee pain, stiffness and a repeated chair-rise test. The study gives a concrete reason to explore exercise designed around a symptomatic knee. [6]
This article follows research on pain and movement in people with diagnosed knee osteoarthritis. The separate chair-yoga feature considers exercise options for people who cannot sit on the floor. Here, the focus is on which symptoms changed, what yoga was compared with, and how the programs were organized. Pain scores matter, but so do stiffness, ease of movement and the extent to which pain interrupts daily life.
Pain, stiffness and function can change in different ways
A 2024 meta-analysis pooled results from 8 trials involving 756 people with knee osteoarthritis. Compared with control groups, yoga produced statistically significant improvements in pain, stiffness and physical function. In this setting, physical function concerns how easily people perform activities affected by their knee symptoms. These findings place yoga among the exercise options worth considering for a troublesome knee. [2]
Separating these outcomes makes the research more useful. When someone says, “My knee is bad today,” they may mean pain, a feeling of stiffness when starting to move, or difficulty completing a movement. The trials measured these aspects separately. A change in one can therefore be discussed without assuming the others changed by the same amount. That gives both the person with knee symptoms and their family a clearer vocabulary for asking what exercise has helped. [2]
The pooled standardized mean differences were −0.92 for pain, −0.51 for stiffness and −0.53 for physical function, all favoring yoga. These are effect sizes that put results from different measurement scales on a comparable basis; they are not percentages of pain removed. For pain, the estimated effect ranged from −1.64 to −0.20 within its 95% confidence interval. Results for pain varied substantially between studies, with the measure of that variation reaching 94%. The overall direction was favorable, while the size of the benefit differed across the underlying trials. [2]
A separate 2026 meta-analysis combined 14 studies involving 1,183 people. It also found improvements in pain and physical function, with effect sizes of −0.79 and −0.39, respectively. The evidence for these findings was rated low certainty. Taken together, the reviews point in a similar direction, even though they bring together different numbers of studies and participants. The positive finding is about symptom-related outcomes, with the strength of the evidence still limited. [1]
The comparison with strengthening exercise also involved people who had meaningful symptoms. Entry to that trial required pain of at least 40 on a 100-mm scale, and the average starting score was 53.8. Yoga was being tested among people choosing exercise while experiencing moderate knee pain. The main pain result did not differ significantly from strengthening exercise, although a fast-paced walking test at 24 weeks was among the outcomes favoring yoga. Both symptoms and movement ability were part of the research question. [4]
初日の汗は、予約した人だけが持ち帰れる。
A trial in older women measured getting up from a chair
The trial with an average age of 72 is especially relevant to readers wondering whether yoga research includes older participants. Its 36 women were randomly assigned to an 8-week yoga program or a wait-list control group. The wait-list participants did not receive yoga during the comparison period. The program combined group and home sessions, and the researchers evaluated knee symptoms as well as lower-limb physical function, sleep and quality of life. [6]
Knee pain, stiffness and function were assessed with WOMAC, the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index. At 8 weeks, the adjusted average pain score was 8.3 in the control group and 5.8 in the yoga group. For stiffness, the corresponding scores were 4.7 and 3.4. Lower scores indicated fewer symptoms on these measures. These figures show the actual comparison behind the statement that pain and stiffness improved, rather than leaving the result as a general claim of benefit. [6]
The study also included the Short Physical Performance Battery, a set of tests of lower-limb function. Its repeated chair-stand component favored yoga. The adjusted average score at 8 weeks was 2.0 in the control group and 2.8 in the yoga group. This was a performance-test result alongside the participants’ reports of symptoms, making it particularly relevant to the ordinary act of getting up from a seat. [6]
A family conversation about the knee can easily stay at the level of “better” or “worse.” This trial suggests a more specific topic: how rising from a chair feels and whether that movement has changed. The study measured repeated chair stands under test conditions, while a conversation at home concerns the person’s own experience. Keeping both in view gives the research an everyday reference point without turning a test score into a prediction for every household. [6]
Measurements were taken at 4, 8 and 20 weeks. Across the period from 4 to 20 weeks, the researchers reported treatment and time effects for WOMAC pain, function and total scores. They also checked body mass index and quality of life, but changes in those outcomes were not significant. The trial therefore supports a focused account of improvements in symptoms and function, while retaining the findings that did not show a clear change. [6]
Retention was 95%, and no yoga-related adverse events were observed. For this small group, participation in a program connecting class sessions with practice at home was feasible. That is a useful result in its own right: an exercise approach has to fit into life before its effects can be assessed. When considering a similar arrangement, the relevant practical questions include whether attending a class and carrying out suitable practice at home are both manageable. [6]
The small sample remains part of the result. These were older women in a pilot trial, rather than a large cross-section of everyone with knee osteoarthritis. The encouraging combination of pain, stiffness and chair-rise findings gives a reason to consider the approach, with the population and study scale kept visible. It is a concrete piece of evidence for later-life exercise rather than a guarantee of the same response in every older adult. [6]
Yoga can be an option alongside strengthening exercise
A 2025 randomized controlled trial directly compared yoga with strengthening exercise. It assigned 117 people with symptomatic knee osteoarthritis to yoga, with 58 participants, or strengthening exercise, with 59. The average age was 62.5, participants were aged 40 or over, and 72.6% were women. This was an active comparison: the question was how yoga performed against another exercise approach, rather than against doing no exercise. [4]
For the first 12 weeks, both groups had 2 supervised sessions and 1 home session each week. During weeks 13–24, both moved to 3 unsupervised home sessions weekly. Matching the frequency made the comparison closer to the decision someone faces when choosing an exercise program. It also made home practice part of the program being tested, rather than an optional detail outside the intervention. [4]
The main outcome was knee pain over 12 weeks, measured with a visual analog scale, or VAS. Participants indicated pain on a 100-mm line running from no pain to the worst possible pain. The difference between groups in the change in pain was −1.1 mm, with a 95% confidence interval of −7.8 to 5.7 mm. The difference was not statistically significant and remained within the prespecified 10-mm noninferiority margin. The authors reported that yoga was noninferior to strengthening exercise. [4]
Yoga does not have to beat strength training to earn a place in knee care. [4]
That distinction matters when choosing an exercise habit. The main result positioned yoga as an alternative or complementary option, with pain improvement comparable to strengthening exercise under the trial’s conditions. Someone deciding with their doctor can therefore consider what they are willing and able to practice. The authors identified a possible role for yoga in clinical exercise choices, while their primary result did not establish yoga as superior for pain. [4]
At 24 weeks, yoga showed modestly greater improvements on outcomes including WOMAC pain, function and stiffness. A fast-paced walking test also favored yoga. Across the 27 secondary outcomes assessed at 12 and 24 weeks, 7 showed statistically significant differences favoring yoga. Reading the main result and these additional results together gives a balanced picture: the main short-term pain comparison was similar, and some later symptom and function measures favored yoga. [4]
A smaller trial examined a yoga program whose poses were chosen with the forces acting on the knee in mind. It involved 31 women with symptomatic knee osteoarthritis, allocated to yoga, machine-based leg strengthening, or a meditation group without exercise. The intervention lasted 12 weeks, with 3 supervised sessions each week lasting 1 hour. This study tested a specifically constructed exercise program, with attention to knee loading built into the selection of movements. [12]
Compared with the nonexercise group, yoga produced a 22.9-point greater improvement in pain on KOOS, the Knee Injury and Osteoarthritis Outcome Score. Self-reported physical function improved by 17.2 points more. Those improvements were similar to the strengthening group’s results. Strengthening exercise produced a greater improvement in knee-flexor strength, the strength used to bend the knee. The outcome you prioritize therefore affects which result is most relevant: pain and reported function gave one comparison, while a specific strength measure gave another. [12]
Yoga also produced a 19.6-point greater improvement in intermittent pain than the nonexercise comparison. Participants were allocated with symptom severity taken into account, and an assessor who did not know their allocation evaluated them before and immediately after the 12-week program. Quality of life improved from baseline within the yoga group. That within-group result was separate from the significant differences in pain and self-reported function against the nonexercise group. [12]
Another pilot randomized trial looked at how older participants felt as well as how their knees functioned. It compared Hatha yoga, aerobic and strengthening exercise, and osteoarthritis education. The study was completed by 83 adults, whose average age was 71.6; 84% were women, and retention was 82%. Both exercise programs involved a weekly 45-minute group class for 8 weeks, together with home practice on 2–4 days each week. [16]
At 8 weeks, yoga produced a greater improvement in participants’ perception of osteoarthritis symptoms than aerobic and strengthening exercise. The between-group difference in change from baseline was −9.6 points, with a 95% confidence interval of −15.3 to −4. Yoga also favored anxiety, by −1.4 points, and fear of falling, by −4.6 points. These results bring feelings associated with movement into the discussion alongside physical symptoms. [16]
Both exercise programs improved symptoms and function, and their class attendance and home-practice adherence did not differ. The favorable symptom and anxiety findings therefore occurred with similar participation in the two programs. There were 3 nonserious adverse events in the aerobic and strengthening group. The study was a short pilot trial in people with knee symptoms, and the improvement in fear-of-falling scores was an outcome about fear; the study did not report actual fall counts. [16]
Look at movement and the way pain interrupts daily life
Pain intensity is one useful outcome. Another is pain interference: the extent to which pain gets in the way of everyday life. A chair-yoga trial among community-dwelling older adults with lower-extremity osteoarthritis found that improvement in pain interference continued for 3 months after the intervention. The separate chair-yoga feature explores that study and the exercise choices available to people who cannot sit on the floor. For this discussion, it contributes an additional question about living with symptoms. [8]
For a person with knee osteoarthritis, a conversation about benefit can therefore include several distinct experiences. How painful is the knee? How stiff does it feel when movement begins? How easy is it to get up? How much does pain interrupt what you want to do? The research discussed here has used different measures to explore these questions. Giving each its own place helps a family discuss a change that might otherwise be hidden inside a single overall judgment. [2][6][8]
This wider view also explains why function results deserve attention when a pain result is less convincing. A trial in 212 adults compared online arthritis information alone with the same information plus recorded yoga videos. At 12 weeks, physical function favored yoga, while pain during walking did not differ significantly between groups. The trial in older women combined symptom improvements with a chair-rise result. These are different patterns of benefit, and both are relevant to someone choosing what to observe over a period of practice. [6][7]
Numbers: knee osteoarthritis and yoga
- A pooled analysis of 8 trials and 756 people favored yoga for pain, stiffness and physical function. [2]
- In 36 women with an average age of 72, 8 weeks brought improvements in pain, stiffness and repeated chair stands. [6]
- Among 117 people with an average age of 62.5, the 12-week pain-change difference was −1.1 mm, with no significant difference between exercise groups. [4]
- A trial of 31 women found a 22.9-point greater improvement in KOOS pain after 12 weeks of yoga than with no exercise. [12]
- In a video-based trial of 212 adults, physical function favored yoga by 4.0 points at 12 weeks; pain during walking did not differ significantly. [7]
初日の汗は、予約した人だけが持ち帰れる。
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