Yoga teaching is largely unregulated. There is no licensing body with legal force in the UK, the UAE or most other places, and the widely cited 200-hour certificate represents about five weeks of full-time study. It is a starting qualification, not a professional credential, and treating it as one is the most common mistake people make when choosing.
What tells you more is how a teacher answers a handful of questions.
The five questions
"Who did you train with, and how long have you been teaching?" You are listening for a named teacher or a named tradition rather than a brand of studio, and for years rather than months. Anyone serious enjoys this question.
"What happens in a first session?" The right answer involves asking you things and watching you move before teaching anything. The wrong answer is a description of a class. This question separates teachers from instructors faster than any other.
"I have [this problem]. Have you worked with it?" The good answer is specific and includes limits, "yes, often, and if it does that when you do this, you need a physiotherapist not me". An answer with no limits in it is a warning.
"What should I be doing between sessions?" A teacher who wants you practising on your own is a teacher optimising for your progress. One who does not is optimising for attendance.
"What do you not teach?" A slightly unfair question and extremely revealing. Everyone has things they are not the right person for. Anyone who claims otherwise is telling you something important.
What the qualifications actually mean
200-hour. The entry-level certificate, roughly five weeks full-time or a few months part-time. Extremely common. It means someone has been taught to lead a class safely. It does not mean much about depth.
500-hour. More substantial, though the number still says little about quality, it depends entirely on where and with whom.
Yoga Alliance registration (RYT / RYS). A voluntary directory, not a regulator. It confirms someone completed a course at a registered school. It is not a licence and it does not investigate teaching quality in any meaningful way.
Lineage training. Years with a named teacher in a named tradition. Uncommon, not standardised, not comparable to hour counts, and generally the most meaningful thing on the list when it is genuine.
Clinical qualifications. A physiotherapist who also teaches yoga is a materially different proposition, particularly around injury. Worth knowing about and worth paying more for when it is relevant.
Warning signs
Medical claims. Anyone telling you yoga will cure, treat or heal a diagnosed condition is making a claim they cannot support, and in most jurisdictions should not be making at all.
Advice to stop a prescribed treatment. Walk away, immediately, and this is not an overreaction.
No interest in your history. A teacher who does not ask about injuries, surgeries, pregnancy or medication before teaching you is not being relaxed; they are missing the information the session should be built from.
Pressure into a long package before you have had a session. A first session should be purchasable on its own.
Pain framed as progress. "Lean into the pain" is not a tradition, it is a bad teacher.
Online specifically
Two extra questions. "How do you correct me without being able to touch me?", you want an actual method involving camera angles, verbal cueing and using the wall and floor, not a shrug. And "where do you want the camera?". A teacher who has thought about online teaching answers this immediately and specifically.
Questions people ask
Is yoga teaching regulated?
Not in most countries, including the UK and the UAE. There is no licensing body with legal force. Yoga Alliance registration is a voluntary directory confirming course completion, not a regulator that assesses teaching quality.
What does a 200-hour yoga certificate mean?
It is the entry-level teaching qualification, roughly five weeks of full-time study. It indicates someone has been taught to lead a class safely. It says little about depth of knowledge or years of experience.
What are the warning signs of a bad yoga teacher?
Claims that yoga cures or treats diagnosed conditions, any suggestion of stopping prescribed treatment, no interest in your injury or medical history, pressure to buy a long package before a first session, and treating pain as a sign of progress.
Does it matter where a teacher trained?
Who they trained with and for how long matters more than where. A named teacher within a named tradition over several years tells you more than an hour count, though neither substitutes for how they answer questions about your own body.
A senior yoga teacher at IndieVeda, teaching one-to-one sessions live from India.