How to Store a Yoga Mat

The short answer

Roll it loosely with the top surface facing outward, stand it upright or lay it flat, and keep it somewhere dry, shaded and room temperature. Never fold it, never store it damp, never leave it in a hot car, and never hang it over a rail by its middle for weeks at a time.

That is the entire answer and it costs nothing. A strap or a bag makes it easier to keep to, which is the only reason to buy either.

Roll it, never fold it

A fold is a crease and a crease is a hinge. Every time you unroll the mat, that hinge flexes in the same place, and in a foam or TPE mat it eventually goes white, then thin, then splits. In a PVC mat it becomes a permanent raised ridge that sits under your hand in downward dog forever. Rubber is the most forgiving and still does not forgive a six-month fold.

Roll loosely rather than tightly. A mat crushed into the smallest possible cylinder and left there for months takes on a curl that fights you at the edges every session — the same memory problem as a fold, spread out. Loose enough that the roll holds its own shape without being cinched to its limit is right.

The honorable exception is the travel mat, which is sold to be folded and built for it. Those are thin, unbacked and designed around the crease, and they are a different product — the travel mats are here. Folding a 6 mm mat because a travel mat folds is the mistake.

Which side out

Top surface outward. Two reasons, and the second one is the one nobody mentions.

First, a roll pulls the inner face tighter than the outer one, so the surface on the inside takes the curl. You want the curl in the underside, where it does not matter, rather than in the face your hands grip. Second, a mat rolled top-out unrolls and lies flat straight away, while a mat rolled top-in lifts at the corners for the first few minutes of every practice. That sounds trivial until you have chased a curling corner through three sun salutations.

If your mat has alignment lines or a printed face, this also keeps the print on the outside of the roll, where it is under less tension — the printed mats are the ones where this shows up soonest.

Where in the house

Three things damage a stored mat: heat, ultraviolet light and moisture. Avoid all three and the location barely matters.

Out of direct sunlight. A sunny window is the worst spot in the house for a mat. Ultraviolet light hardens natural rubber and fades and embrittles PVC and TPE. A mat airing outdoors for an afternoon is fine and useful; a mat living in a sunbeam is slowly being destroyed.

Room temperature, not a car and not a loft. A closed car in summer reaches temperatures that soften and deform a rolled mat permanently, and the roll takes on whatever shape it was pressed into. An unheated garage or loft swings the other way and makes foam brittle.

Somewhere it can breathe. A rubber or cork mat sealed inside a zipped bag for a week develops the smell this site gets asked about constantly. If you store it in a bag, store it dry and open the bag, or use a sling rather than a sealed bag. The full explanation is in why your mat smells.

Standing upright in a corner, a basket or an umbrella stand is the best of the easy options: nothing presses on it, air reaches it, and it is visible, which genuinely does make you more likely to practice. Flat under a sofa is the next best. Hanging over a towel rail is fine for a day of drying and bad as a permanent home, because the rail becomes a crease.

Storage by material

The cotton row is the only one where folding is correct, which is worth knowing if you own a rug as well as a mat. Everything with a closed surface gets rolled.