Boutique Fitness Industry Statistics: The Best Time of Day to Host a Pilates Class
In 2025, Pilates was the single most-booked workout on ClassPass for the third year in a row, with bookings up 66% year over year. According to Ahrefs data, the term "Pilates" was searched globally more than 1.5 million times in 2025 alone. In the U.S. specifically, more than 13 million people practiced Pilates in 2025, which is a 6.8% increase from the previous year.
That demand is great news for studio owners, until you're the one staring at an empty 9:00 AM mat class next to a reformer session that's booked solid three weeks out.
Search interest in "boutique fitness industry statistics" has been climbing alongside the Pilates boom. But understanding that Pilates is popular doesn’t tell you what you actually need to know to meet demand: when clients are trying to book.
Below, we break down what the latest booking data says about the best time of day to book a Pilates class and what that pattern means for running a studio, so you can staff, schedule, and market around real behavior instead of guesswork.
The state of the boutique fitness industry right now
Pilates wasn't just the top workout in 2025, it outpaced every other category on ClassPass's top-five list:
| Workout | 2025 booking growth (YoY) |
|---|---|
| Pilates | +66% |
| Barre | +30% |
| Yoga | +28% |
| Strength training | +27% |
| Cycling | +6% |
Within Pilates itself, the format breakdown tells its own story about where boutique fitness trends are heading.
Growth of Pilates formats YoY
Reformer Pilates bookings grew 71%
Mat Pilates bookings grew 114%
Higher-intensity Pilates formats grew 27%
Reformer studios may get the headlines, but mat-based classes are the fastest-growing segment. If you’re planning where to add classes or invest in equipment, mat’s growth rate is worth weighing against reformer’s larger current share.
Trending demographics in Pilates
Pilates is also drawing a different crowd. Strava reported a 15% increase in Pilates and yoga activity uploads among male users in 2024, part of a broader move toward low-impact, flexibility-focused training.
Millennials and Gen Z make up 60% of Pilates practitioners today, while high-income households earning more than $100,000 a year make up 45% of the boutique Pilates market. If your marketing still targets a narrower demographic, it’s worth revisiting who the boutique fitness industry is serving in 2026.
When are clients booking Pilates classes?
The data on when people book fitness classes overall can help you build a smarter Pilates class schedule. Here's what the numbers show, and what they mean for your studio.
General workout preferences
In a 2024 survey of 1,000 Americans, the workout app Flex found that 65% of gymgoers prefer to work out in the morning, and 75% of those same individuals say workout time impacts their exercise quality.
While morning workouts may be the general preference in the U.S., ClassPass’s 2025 data revealed worldwide daily, weekly, and monthly trends that show where the client demand is:
Weekday bookings peak around 6:00 PM, consistent with an after-work wind-down slot.
Weekend bookings peak around 10:00 AM, the classic "start the day" slot.
Tuesday is the most popular day to book a workout, and March is the most popular month.
Lunch-hour bookings made between 11:00 AM and 1:00 PM rose 38% globally year over year, making midday the fastest-growing time slot.
If your studio only offers morning and evening sessions, consider testing these patterns against your own calendar. Add a lunchtime class and track which hours book up first.
What this means for studio owners
This data gives you a starting point for where to put your limited time, resources, and budget. Acuity Scheduling gives you visibility into your own booking patterns over time, so you can see whether your studio matches these trends or runs on its own rhythm. From there, you can adjust class times, add capacity during peak windows, run smart promotions, or shift staffing to help your business run in tune with your clients’ needs.
And when those clients book, tools like automated reminders and no-show protection make sure every mat or reformer is filled.
Is your city a Pilates hotspot?
Pilates is already the format defining boutique fitness. The studios that win from here will be the ones scheduling and staffing around when clients actually want to show up.
If you want to see how your city and studio stack up against the national picture, our companion piece, Pilates Obsessed Cities, breaks down which U.S. cities have the highest concentration of Pilates studios and bookings.
See where you rank, then make sure your booking page is ready to bring more obsessed clients to your doorstep.
