Baduanjin is a set of eight slow movements from Chinese qigong. The name is usually translated as the eight brocades, after a silk woven with a raised pattern, and suggests eight fine pieces of one cloth. Texts from the Song dynasty, around the twelfth century, already describe an early version, and later manuals drew a seated set beside the standing one. All it needs is room to raise your arms overhead and take one wide step.

The eight, in plain words

The traditional names are poetic, and a few promise things about organs or energy that nobody has shown. Here is what each move asks of you, in the usual order:

1. Two hands hold up the heavens: lace your fingers and press the palms slowly toward the ceiling.
2. Drawing the bow to shoot the hawk: from a wide stance, one hand points away while the other pulls back like a bowstring.
3. Separating heaven and earth: one palm presses up while the other presses down beside your hip, then they trade.
4. The wise owl gazes backward: turn your head slowly to look over one shoulder, then the other.
5. Swaying the head and shaking the tail: hands on your thighs, lean over one knee and circle across to the other.
6. Two hands hold the feet: a soft forward fold, hands sliding down the backs of your legs.
7. Clenching the fists and glaring fiercely: a slow punch from the waist with wide, steady eyes.
8. Bouncing on the toes: rise onto the balls of your feet and lower your heels with a small, soft bump.

How this page works

The worksheet is a folding screen of eight silk panels, one for each move. Tap a panel and its card opens below with cues for doing the move slowly, a seated way, and for the moves that test your footing, a steadier way with a hand on a counter. On each card you choose six or eight times through, and whether you stand or sit.

From those choices the page times your session: half a minute to settle, eight to fourteen seconds for each time through a move (one side counts as one time when a move alternates), and half a minute to close. Six of everything comes to ten minutes, eight of everything to thirteen.

Press begin and the timer travels across the screen in order. The lit panel is the one you are on, the card counts your times through and tells you when to breathe in and out, and nothing makes a sound. Tap any panel to jump the timer there.

When you finish, weave the day in. Eight threads join a four-week ribbon: gold for the panels you stood for, sage for the ones you sat for, and a shorter thread where you chose six. A short reading under the ribbon says what has changed since your first day.

The four-week plan

Week one asks for all eight moves, six times each, on five days. Week two keeps that count and invites you to stand where you feel steady. Week three moves up to eight times each, and week four adds a sixth practice day. A missed day stays open until you come back to it, and a panel that never feels right standing can stay seated for good.

What the studies show, and where they stop

Baduanjin has been the subject of many small studies, mostly in China. A 2018 review of 22 studies found results that support it as an add-on in rehabilitation, with improvements reported in thinking, mood and physical measures, and its authors asked for more rigorous trials with longer follow-up before anyone draws firm conclusions. A 2022 meta-analysis of 17 randomized trials involving 1,267 older adults found better balance test scores in the baduanjin groups than in the comparison groups, and it too called for higher-quality evidence.

A 2025 analysis of 40 studies is the most useful for setting expectations. It also found balance improvements in older adults, rated the overall quality of the studies as relatively low, and reported that the clearer gains showed up after about twelve weeks of sessions lasting thirty to forty-nine minutes, five to seven days a week. That is a far bigger dose than ten to thirteen minutes for four weeks. Treat this plan as a way to learn the set and build the habit, not as the program those trials tested. None of this research shows baduanjin acting on energy or on the organs its old names mention.

Staying safe, and when to sit

Talk with a doctor or physical therapist before your first session if you have had a fall, dizzy spells, a joint replacement, a heart or blood pressure condition, or ongoing pain. Stop any move that hurts. Keep a sturdy chair or counter within reach whenever you stand, and use the seated way for the forward fold if bending leaves you lightheaded.

When to use it

It fits the start of a morning or a break from sitting. For a slower start on stepping, The Tai Chi Starter Scroll brings in one new tai chi form each week. If standing is off the table, this tai chi plan done entirely in a chair stays seated throughout. For steadier footing, The Balance Ladder works on it directly.