"Is Bikram yoga still popular?" usually means one of two different questions. One is about the practice itself — whether people still show up to class. The other is about the name — whether "Bikram yoga" is still what people type into Google. This article answers the second question: what happened to the name, why people still search for it out of habit, and what that means if you are trying to find (or teach) an authentic class today. For the full picture of the practice's health post-controversy — studio counts, research, Choudhury's current status — see the current state of Bikram yoga in 2026.
The short version: the name has declined. The practice has not. The 26-posture sequence itself is still widely taught — just increasingly under a different name. To understand the modern, community-led revival of the 26-and-2 method, one must analyze the Bikram yoga documentary and its impact on shifting student demographics, and the man at the center of it — Bikram Choudhury's full story — for context this article does not repeat.
Why Is It No Longer Called Bikram Yoga?
Stage 1: Post-2019 Community Rebranding
The 2017 Netflix documentary about Bikram Choudhury's conduct accelerated a rebranding wave across the studio network. Most studios that had operated under the Bikram Yoga franchise or brand name dropped it and adopted alternatives — primarily 26 and 2 yoga, original hot yoga, and hot 26 and 2. This was a community-driven decision by individual studio owners, not a centralised institutional change.
The community's motivation is well-documented in the Reddit r/yoga thread (160 or more comments): "The practice and community are much greater than the man himself." Practitioners and studio owners chose to separate the practice from its founder's name while retaining the practice itself.
Stage 2: KPC Group Acquisition (March 2023)
In March 2023, the Bikram Yoga brand name was acquired by KPC Group, a US healthcare company expanding its KPC Lyfe holistic health initiative. The bikramyoga.com domain — the original institutional home of Bikram yoga — now operates as an Original Hot Yoga programme under this new ownership. The "Bikram Yoga" trademark is now owned by a corporate entity, not by Choudhury or his former organisation.
Most established studios had already rebranded to 26 and 2 or original hot yoga terminology before this acquisition, making it largely irrelevant to the teaching community — but significant for anyone searching for the brand name today and wondering who is actually behind it. The 2015 US Ninth Circuit ruling established that yoga sequences cannot be copyrighted. Any certified instructor can teach the 26-posture sequence under any descriptive name without licensing obligations.
What People Actually Search For Now
Search behaviour around this topic is messier than the rebranding itself suggests. Three overlapping groups are still typing "Bikram yoga" into Google in 2026, for three different reasons — and none of them are looking for the same thing.
- Legacy searchers — long-time practitioners who learned the practice under the Bikram name before 2017 and have never updated their search habit. They are usually looking for a class, not the controversy.
- News searchers — people who encountered the name through the documentary, a news story, or the 2023 conviction, and are searching to understand who Bikram Choudhury is and what happened to him rather than to find a studio.
- Studio searchers — people who were told by a friend or found an old listing referencing "Bikram yoga near me," not realising the studio itself may now market under 26 and 2 yoga or original hot yoga branding.
This is why "Bikram yoga" search volume looks stable or even resilient in some data sets despite near-universal studio rebranding: the query volume is not one audience, it is three audiences with different intents converging on the same two words. A studio evaluating whether to keep "Bikram" in its own marketing should think about which of these three audiences it is actually trying to reach.
evolationyoga.com (February 2023) states correctly that the practice "is becoming increasingly popular due to its health benefits, wide range of poses, and accessibility." The Quora question "Why do so many people do Bikram Hot Yoga?" reflects the studio-searcher group above — people who still use the old name as shorthand for the practice itself, regardless of what any individual studio now calls it.
What Studios Call It — and Why That Matters If You're Searching
If you search "Bikram yoga classes near me" today, you may miss studios that teach the identical sequence under a different name. bikramyoga.com — the original domain — is now active again under KPC Group as an Original Hot Yoga programme. Most independent studios use 26 and 2 yoga or original hot yoga. YogaFX teaches it as Original 26 and 2 Hot Yoga, reflecting both direct Choudhury-era lineage and a natural tropical heat environment rather than electric heaters. The current state of Bikram yoga article breaks down exactly which name is used in which market and by which certifying body, so this article won't repeat that table — the practical takeaway here is simply: if a "Bikram yoga" search comes up empty in your city, search "26 and 2 yoga" and "original hot yoga" next. The postures, heat, and 90-minute structure are identical regardless of the label.
The Honest Assessment
Is the Bikram Yoga brand still popular as a search term? Yes, but for fragmented reasons that have little to do with wanting to book a class under that specific name. The name now carries associations — some practitioners, studios, and corporate wellness buyers actively avoid it, which is part of why it changed hands to a healthcare company rather than staying with a yoga community.
Is the practice — the 26-posture fixed sequence in heat — still popular? Yes, clearly, and that question is answered in full with the research and studio data in the current state of Bikram yoga in 2026. What this article adds is the missing piece: understanding why the name search behaviour looks confusing is the difference between finding an authentic class today and giving up because your first search came back empty.
FAQ
Why do people still search "Bikram yoga" if studios don't call it that anymore?
Because search habits lag behind rebranding by years, and because the query serves at least three different intents at once: long-time practitioners using old habit, news readers looking into the Bikram Choudhury story, and newcomers who were told to look for "Bikram yoga near me" without knowing studios have renamed. All three groups keep the search term alive even though almost no studio actively markets under it anymore.
Why is it no longer called Bikram yoga?
Two reasons. First, following the 2017 Netflix documentary about Bikram Choudhury's conduct, most studios voluntarily rebranded to separate the practice from its founder. Second, the Bikram Yoga trademark was acquired by KPC Group in March 2023. The practice itself is unchanged — the 2015 US Ninth Circuit ruling established that yoga sequences cannot be copyrighted, so any certified instructor can teach the 26-posture sequence freely.
What should I search for instead of "Bikram yoga" to find a class?
Try "26 and 2 yoga," "original hot yoga," or "hot 26 and 2" alongside your city name. These describe the identical 26-posture, 40°C sequence under the names most independent studios now use. If those searches also come up short, "hot yoga studio" combined with a question about whether they teach the fixed 26-posture sequence will usually surface the same practice under a generic label.
Which celebrities practice Bikram or hot yoga?
Jennifer Aniston, Madonna, and Lady Gaga have all been publicly associated with the practice. The Rockettes have used it as part of their training programme. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar credited the practice with extending his NBA career. Andy Murray incorporated hot yoga into his Wimbledon preparation. These endorsements reflect the practice's documented benefits for both general wellness and elite athletic performance, and they predate and survive the post-2019 rebranding.
Is Bikram yoga coming back as a brand name?
Unlikely, and largely beside the point. bikramyoga.com is active again under KPC Group as an Original Hot Yoga programme, but the teaching community has already moved on to 26 and 2 yoga and original hot yoga as the working names. The practice never went away — only the name most people use for it changed, and search habits are simply the slowest part of that transition to catch up.