There are hundreds of meditation techniques, but most fall into a handful of groups. A 2019 study that asked 100 experienced meditators to compare the 20 most popular techniques found seven types: body-centered meditation (breath, body scan), mindful observation (sitting in silence, watching thoughts), contemplation, mantra meditation, visual concentration (visualizations), affect-centered meditation (compassion, loving-kindness) and meditation with movement (walking, yoga, qigong). Relaxation techniques like progressive muscle relaxation and yoga nidra sit right next to them.
Below is each type in plain words, well-known styles and where they belong, and a quick chooser so you can pick one to try today.
The 7 types of meditation at a glance
| Type | What you do | Examples | Good if you |
|---|---|---|---|
| Body-centered | Rest attention on the breath or the body | Breath at the nose or belly, body scan, focusing on a place in the body | Want something simple and concrete |
| Mindful observation | Sit or lie still and notice whatever comes up | Sitting in silence, observing thoughts and emotions, lying meditation | Want to see your thoughts more clearly |
| Contemplation | Stay with a question or a paradox without thinking it through | "Who am I?", koans | Like reflective, open-ended practice |
| Mantra | Repeat a sound, word or phrase, silently or aloud | Mantra repetition, chanting, meditation with sound | Find words or sound easier to hold than the breath |
| Visual concentration | Hold a picture or an object in your attention | Guided visualization, gazing at an object | Think in images |
| Affect-centered | Cultivate a feeling toward yourself or others | Loving-kindness (metta), compassion, Tonglen | Tend to be hard on yourself or others |
| With movement | Pay attention while you move or change your breath | Walking meditation, yoga, tai chi, qigong, breathing exercises | Find sitting still difficult |
The seven groups come from Matko and Sedlmeier's 2019 study in Frontiers in Psychology. They also found two dimensions that separate techniques: how much a practice focuses on the body (breath and body scan at one end, questions and mantras at the other) and how active it is (sitting in silence at one end, walking and movement at the other).
Body-centered meditation: breath and body scan
The most common starting point. You rest your attention on a physical sensation: the air at your nostrils, your belly rising and falling, or one body part after another in a body scan. When your mind wanders, you come back to the sensation.
Try it: Sit comfortably and count ten out-breaths. If you lose count, start again at one.
Body-centered practice is also the natural home of breath awareness, where you don't change the breath at all. Actively changing it, such as breathing out longer or holding the breath, is a breathing exercise; our overview of breathing techniques covers those. If your body is what's tense, our guide on how to release tension in your body combines a body scan with tensing and releasing muscles.
Mindful observation: sitting in silence
Here there's no single object. You sit (or lie) still and notice what shows up: sounds, sensations, thoughts, feelings. You let each one come and go without holding on. Researchers link this group to what is often called "open monitoring." The study names Shikantaza as one example of sitting in silence.
Try it: Set a timer for three minutes and, each time you notice a thought, silently say "thinking" and let it go.
This type suits people who want to understand their own mind better. It can feel harder than body-centered practice at first, because there's less to hold on to.
Contemplation
You stay with a question or a paradox without trying to solve it with ordinary thinking. Examples from the study: contemplating a question like "Who am I?" and concentrating on a contradiction, as with a koan. It's the most conceptual type and usually taught within a tradition.
Mantra meditation
You repeat a syllable, word or phrase, silently or aloud, and return to it when your mind wanders. In the study this group also includes chanting and meditation with sound, such as humming or singing bowls. Transcendental Meditation (TM) is a well-known mantra technique; according to its official site it is practiced sitting with eyes closed for 20 minutes twice a day and taught by certified TM teachers.
Try it: Pick a short, neutral word such as "calm" and repeat it silently with each out-breath for two minutes.
Visual concentration and guided visualization
You hold an image in your mind or rest your eyes on an object. Guided visualization walks you through a calm scene, like a forest or a beach, with all your senses. If you think in pictures, this is often the easiest way in. Our guided visualization for sleep has a full script.
Affect-centered meditation: loving-kindness and compassion
Instead of observing, you cultivate a feeling. In loving-kindness (metta) meditation you silently wish yourself and others well, often in a set order: yourself, a friend, a neutral person, someone difficult, everyone. The study groups loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity together here. These four come from Buddhist teachings, where they're called the brahmaviharas. The study also lists Tonglen in this group.
Try it: Silently repeat "May I be well. May I be at ease." for a minute, then the same for someone you like.
Meditation with movement
Attention stays on the body while it moves. Walking meditation means walking slowly and noticing each step, the feet, the air, the ground. Yoga, tai chi and qigong are movement-based practices with meditative elements. The study also placed deliberately changing your breath close to this group.
Try it: Walk ten slow steps and notice only the moment each foot touches the floor.
Relaxation techniques that sit next to meditation
Some practices are usually counted as relaxation techniques rather than meditation, although they overlap. The US National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) lists, among others:
- Progressive muscle relaxation (PMR): tensing different muscles and then releasing the tension.
- Autogenic training: mental exercises and phrases you suggest to yourself, focusing on the body's experience of relaxation, such as heaviness and warmth.
- Guided imagery: picturing calm scenes to produce a similar feeling in your body.
- Breathing exercises: for example slow, deep breaths into the belly, also called diaphragmatic breathing.
Yoga nidra is a guided practice done lying down that moves through the body, the breath and images in a set order. Our comparison of yoga nidra and meditation explains how it differs from a seated practice.
Types of meditation in Buddhism
Buddhism isn't one type of meditation but a source of many. The 2019 study describes a few Buddhist links:
- The four brahmaviharas (loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity) come from Buddhist teachings and form the heart of the affect-centered group.
- Walking and breathing: when only Buddhist meditators rated the techniques, walking meditation moved into the body-centered group. The authors explain that in Buddhist practice walking meditation is commonly alternated with breathing meditation.
- The whole body as an anchor: the authors note that Buddhist teachings treat body and mind as equally valid objects of meditation.
- Visualization: merging with a visual representation of a deity is described as a typical Tibetan Buddhist practice.
The Buddhist meditators in the study came from Zen, Theravada, Vipassana and mindfulness-based traditions. Hindu and yoga traditions are represented as well, for example by focusing on energy centers in the body, which yoga calls chakras. We describe these traditions only as far as the study does; each has its own teachers and texts if you want to go deeper.
How to choose your type of meditation
Pick by what you want right now, not by what sounds most impressive:
| If you want to | Start with |
|---|---|
| Learn meditation from scratch | Breath awareness or a short body scan, with our guide on how to meditate for beginners |
| Calm a tense body | Progressive muscle relaxation, then a body scan |
| Fall asleep | A lying practice: body scan, yoga nidra or a calm visualization |
| Handle a busy mind | Counting breaths, or noticing and naming thoughts |
| Be kinder to yourself | Loving-kindness or a self-compassion practice |
| Meditate without sitting still | Walking meditation or mindful movement |
| Something very short | One minute on the breath, see our 1-minute meditation |
Give one type a week before you switch. Every type feels awkward at first. Researchers also point out that techniques in different groups may have different effects, but that this still needs to be tested in studies, so there's no scientific ranking of which type is "best."
Which types of meditation are in the app
AI Meditation: Sleep & Calm has guided sessions for several of these types:
- Body-centered: Breath Awareness and Body Scan for Deep Relaxation.
- Mindful observation: Unhooking From Thoughts: Stepping Out of the Rumination Loop practices noticing thoughts without following them; Mindful Observation: Waking the Senses uses a sight or sound as an anchor.
- Visualization: nature journeys such as Forest Walk: Into the Calm of Nature and Journey on the Quiet Sea.
- Kindness: Self-Kindness: When You're Hard on Yourself is the closest to affect-centered practice. It is not a classic loving-kindness sequence.
- Relaxation techniques: Dream Journey with Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR), Mini-Reset: Arriving and Relaxing (a short PMR exercise) and Back to Sleep with the Yoga Nidra Method.
- Silence: Free practice is a simple timer with a singing bowl at the beginning and the end.
There is no mantra, contemplation or walking meditation session. You can set how long a session lasts within its range, and the voices are AI voices. There's also a daily meditation written by AI after a short mood check-in. See how the app works, try it for free, no account needed.
Your health
This app is a wellness app and does not replace medical advice. Meditation and relaxation techniques are usually considered low risk, but some people have negative experiences such as increased anxiety. If a practice makes you feel worse, stop, and if stress or low mood last for weeks, talk to a doctor. NCCIH's page on relaxation techniques covers safety.
Sources
All pages accessed on September 25, 2026.
- Matko K, Sedlmeier P. What Is Meditation? Proposing an Empirically Derived Classification System. Frontiers in Psychology, 2019. The 20 techniques, seven groups and two dimensions; Buddhist and Hindu examples.
- NCCIH: Relaxation Techniques: What You Need To Know (last updated June 2021). Types of relaxation techniques, side effects.
- NCCIH: Meditation and Mindfulness: Effectiveness and Safety (last updated June 2022). Focused and mindfulness forms of meditation.
- Moszeik EN, et al. The Effects of an Online Yoga Nidra Meditation on Subjective Well-Being and Diurnal Salivary Cortisol. Stress and Health, 2025. Yoga nidra as a structured practice lying down; chakras in yoga.
- Transcendental Meditation (official site): Meditation Techniques: The Ultimate Beginner's Guide. How TM is practiced.
