Best Yoga Accessories Australia

The Essentials vs the Nice-to-Haves

Walk into any yoga retailer and you'll find walls of accessories promising to transform your practice. Bolsters shaped like crescent moons. Crystal-infused eye pillows. Cork blocks with motivational quotes laser-etched into them. It's easy to spend $400 before you've done a single downward dog.

Here's the truth: you need about five things. Maybe six if you do hot yoga. Everything else is either a luxury or a solution to a problem you don't have yet.

We've ranked yoga accessories into three tiers based on how many people genuinely need them, not how many people get talked into buying them at a studio open day.

Tier 1 — Essential (Buy Before Your First Session)

• Yoga mat: Non-negotiable. Your feet slip on carpet, timber is too hard on your knees, and a towel bunches up the moment you shift weight. A proper yoga mat gives you grip, cushioning, and a defined practice space. If you only buy one thing, buy this.
• Yoga blocks (pair): If you can't touch your toes — and most beginners can't — blocks bring the floor closer to your hands. They're not a crutch. They're an alignment tool that lets you hold poses with proper form instead of rounding your back and straining your hamstrings. Physios recommend them routinely.
• Yoga strap: Same principle as blocks but for reach. Can't clasp your hands behind your back in cow face pose? A strap bridges the gap. Tight hamstrings turning seated forward fold into a frustration exercise? Loop a strap around your feet. At $15, it's the cheapest piece of gear that will make the biggest difference to a beginner.

Tier 2 — Strongly Recommended (Buy Within Your First Month)

• Yoga towel: Essential if you do any form of heated yoga, power vinyasa, or if you simply sweat a lot. A standard mat gets dangerously slippery when wet. A microfibre towel with grip dots on the underside sits on top of your mat and actually gets grippier as you sweat. Also excellent for hygiene if you're using studio mats.
• Carrying strap: Not glamorous, but remarkably practical. Walking to the studio with a rolled-up mat under your arm gets old fast. A proper carrying strap frees your hands and distributes the weight across your shoulder. If you practice anywhere outside your lounge room, you'll use this every session.

Tier 3 — Convenience (Buy When You Want Them)

• Water bottle: You should be hydrating anyway. An insulated bottle keeps water cold through a 75-minute hot yoga class. Not yoga-specific gear, but it earns its place in your kit bag.

That's the honest list. Six items total, and you can get started with just the first three for under $100. Let's break each one down properly.

Yoga Blocks

What They're Actually For

Blocks serve three purposes in yoga, and none of them is "cheating at poses."

Height adjustment: In standing poses like triangle (trikonasana), your hand is supposed to reach the floor beside your front foot. If your hamstrings, hips, or side body aren't open enough, you'll round your spine to get there — defeating the purpose of the pose entirely. A block under your hand gives you the 15-20cm you need to keep your chest open and your spine long. That's correct alignment, not a shortcut.

Support: In restorative yoga, blocks support your body so you can hold poses for minutes at a time without muscular effort. A block under your sacrum in supported bridge, or under your forehead in child's pose, lets gravity do the stretching while you focus on breathing. Physiotherapists use blocks in rehabilitation for exactly this reason.

Activation: Squeeze a block between your inner thighs in bridge pose and you'll fire up your adductors in a way that no verbal cue ever achieves. Place a block between your hands overhead in warrior I and suddenly your shoulder alignment clicks into place. Blocks aren't just passive supports — they're proprioceptive tools that teach your body correct muscle engagement.

Materials Compared

EVA foam is what most people should buy. It's light (about 120g per block), firm enough to support your weight, soft enough that it won't hurt if you accidentally knee it during a transition, and cheap enough that buying two doesn't sting. The slight give in foam also makes it more comfortable under your hands during extended holds. Virtually every yoga studio in Australia uses foam blocks for their beginner classes.

Cork is heavier (about 450g), harder, and grippier — especially when wet. Cork blocks are popular with experienced practitioners who prefer a solid, unyielding surface and don't mind the extra weight in their bag. They're also more environmentally sustainable than EVA foam, though the price reflects that (typically $30-45 per block vs $10-15 for foam).

Wood (usually bamboo or pine) is the traditional material. Beautiful, extremely durable, and completely rigid. But they're heavy, expensive, and unforgiving on your body if you land on one wrong. Unless you're furnishing a boutique studio, wood blocks are more aesthetic choice than practical one.

How Many Do You Need?

Two. Full stop. Most poses that use blocks use them in pairs — one under each hand in standing forward fold, one on each side for supported fish pose, or one at each hip for seated meditation. Buying a single block is like buying one shoe. You can make it work, but you'll always wish you had the pair.

Yoga Straps

What They're Actually For

A yoga strap extends your reach. That sounds simple, and it is — but the impact on your practice is enormous.

Consider seated forward fold. If your hamstrings are tight (and if you work at a desk, they are), you can't reach your feet without rounding your back into a C-shape. Your lower back takes the strain, your hamstrings barely stretch, and you wonder why this pose feels awful. Loop a strap around the balls of your feet, hold the ends, and suddenly you can sit tall with a long spine while gently pulling yourself forward from the hips. The stretch goes exactly where it should — into your hamstrings and calves — without compromising your back.

Straps are equally valuable for shoulder openers. Poses like cow face arms (gomukhasana), where you clasp your hands behind your back, are impossible for most people with normal shoulder mobility. A strap between your hands lets you work the pose progressively, closing the gap over weeks and months until your fingers eventually meet.

Yoga teachers also use straps for bound poses, for keeping arms at specific widths during overhead work, and as a proprioceptive aid to maintain alignment. At $15, a strap is the single best-value yoga accessory you can own.

Length Guide

Straps typically come in 1.8m, 2.5m, and 3m lengths. For most adults, 2.5m is the sweet spot. It's long enough to loop around your feet with plenty of tail to hold, long enough for most shoulder binds, and not so long that excess strap puddles on the floor and tangles during transitions. If you're over 190cm tall or particularly broad-shouldered, go for 3m. The 1.8m straps are fine for kids' classes but limiting for adult practice.

D-Ring vs Buckle vs Cinch

D-ring (two metal D-shaped rings) is the most common closure. Thread the strap through both rings, fold back through one, and it locks firmly under tension. Easy to adjust mid-pose with one hand, won't slip, and doesn't dig into your skin. This is what we stock and what most studios use.

Plastic buckle (quick-release clip) is faster to open and close but can pinch skin and tends to release unexpectedly under heavy load. Fine for light stretching, annoying for anything where you're pulling hard.

Cinch/loop straps have no hardware — just a sewn loop at one end. Simplest design, nothing to break, but harder to adjust precisely. Better suited to resistance work than traditional yoga.

Yoga Towels

What They're Actually For

If you've ever slid forward in downward dog because your palms were sweating, you understand the problem a yoga towel solves. Standard PVC and TPE yoga mats lose grip when wet. It doesn't matter how premium the mat is — physics wins. Moisture between your skin and a smooth surface means less friction, and less friction means your hands creep forward while your feet creep back until you're doing an accidental split instead of a pose.

A yoga towel sits on top of your mat and reverses the equation. Microfibre towels with silicone grip dots on the underside get stickier when damp. The more you sweat, the better they grip. This is why they're considered mandatory equipment for Bikram (hot yoga at 40°C), power vinyasa, and any heated class.

Even if you don't do hot yoga, towels serve a hygiene function. If you practice on studio mats (which dozens of sweaty strangers also use), laying your own towel down creates a clean barrier. Some practitioners also prefer the feel of soft microfibre under their hands and feet compared to the slightly sticky texture of bare mat.

Microfibre vs Cotton

Microfibre is the standard for yoga towels. It absorbs moisture rapidly, dries fast (hang it up after class and it's dry within an hour), weighs very little, and packs down small. The best microfibre towels have silicone dots or nubs on the underside that grip the mat and prevent the towel from bunching during transitions. This is what you want.

Cotton towels absorb well but dry slowly, weigh considerably more, take up more space in your bag, and — critically — tend to slide around on the mat surface. A regular bath towel from Kmart might seem like a cheap alternative, but you'll spend half your practice straightening it. Proper microfibre yoga towels are purpose-built for the job, and the $32 is well spent.

Yoga Mats

We've written extensively about mats in our Gym Mat vs Yoga Mat comparison and our Best Home Gym Mats guide, so we'll keep this brief.

For pure yoga practice, you want a mat that's 4-6mm thick (thick enough to cushion your knees in low lunge, thin enough to feel the floor for balance), non-slip on both surfaces (top for your hands and feet, bottom so the mat doesn't skate across the floor), and long enough to lie down on without your head or feet hanging off the edge. Standard length is 173cm; if you're tall, look for 183cm or longer.

Our Premium Yoga Mat ticks all the boxes at a fair price. It's 6mm thick, has alignment marks etched into the surface to help you position your hands and feet consistently, and the textured surface provides reliable grip even during sweaty sessions.

Carrying Solutions

This is the accessory nobody thinks about until they're walking 800 metres from the car park to the studio, mat slipping out from under their arm, bag strap cutting into their other shoulder, water bottle wedged in their armpit. A mat carrying strap costs $18 and solves this entire situation.

Our carrying strap is adjustable and fits mats up to 15mm thick. You roll your mat, cinch the strap around each end, sling it over your shoulder, and walk hands-free. It also works as a makeshift yoga strap in a pinch — thread it through the buckle and use it for hamstring stretches — though it's thicker and less comfortable than a dedicated strap for that purpose.

If you only practice at home, you probably don't need one. If you walk, cycle, or take public transport to class, you absolutely do.

The Complete Yoga Starter Kit

Here's what a complete beginner setup looks like using our range, with nothing unnecessary and nothing missing:

Total: $149. That's a mat, blocks, strap, towel, and carrying solution for less than a single pair of designer yoga leggings. Orders over $75 ship free Australia-wide, so you'll pay nothing for delivery.

If you're on a tighter budget, start with just the mat, blocks, and strap for $99 and add the towel and carrying strap later. Those three items will serve you through months of practice without limitation.

What You Don't Need

The yoga accessories market is worth billions globally, and a lot of that money goes towards things beginners (and frankly, most experienced practitioners) can do without. Here's what we'd skip:

Yoga Wheels

A hollow plastic or cork wheel that you roll under your back to deepen backbends. Looks great on Instagram. In practice, they're an intermediate-to-advanced tool that most people use once, realise they're not flexible enough for it, and stash in a cupboard. If you can already hold a comfortable wheel pose (urdhva dhanurasana) and want to deepen it, sure. If you're still working on cobra, save your $60.

Expensive Bolsters

Bolsters are genuinely useful for restorative yoga — but a firm pillow or a rolled-up blanket does the same job for zero dollars. Studio bolsters make sense because they're shared across hundreds of students and need to hold their shape. At home, your couch cushion is fine. Wait until you have a dedicated yoga space and a regular restorative practice before investing $80-120 in a proper bolster.

Electronic Meditation Aids

Vibrating headbands that track your brainwaves. Apps with $200/year subscriptions. Smart rings that score your meditation sessions. The entire point of meditation is learning to sit with your own mind without external stimulation. A device that buzzes every time your attention wanders is the opposite of what you're trying to achieve. Your breath is free. Use it.

Toe Separators and Foot Alignment Socks

Unless you've been specifically prescribed these by a podiatrist for a medical condition, they're a solution in search of a problem. Regular barefoot yoga practice naturally strengthens foot muscles and improves toe splay over time. You don't need a $30 silicone device to do what the practice itself already does.

Overpriced "Eco" Mats Over $150

Some brands charge $180+ for a yoga mat by slapping "natural rubber" and "sustainable" on the label. Natural rubber mats are genuinely excellent — they grip well and biodegrade at end of life. But you don't need to spend $180 to get those benefits. Many mid-range mats ($50-80) use recycled or sustainably sourced materials and perform identically in practice. The premium you pay above that point is largely for the brand name on the tag.

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