People choose to learn martial arts for several different reasons. Some are looking for a fun way to stay in shape. Others want to hone their skills and participate in martial arts competitions. Still others are looking for practical skills that they can use to defend themselves if they ever end up in a physically dangerous situation.

If you want to learn a martial art for self-defence purposes, you’re probably wondering “what martial art should I learn?” Several martial arts are useful in self-defence situations.

Here are a few martial arts you may want to study to improve your self-defence skills.

1. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ)

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, commonly known as BJJ, is a martial art that focuses on grappling with an opponent. Though most fights start standing, a lot of them end up on the ground. This is especially true in self-defence situations, and even more true when a woman is being attacked by someone who intends to sexually assault her.

To defend yourself, you’ll need to know how to handle a fight on the ground. This is why BJJ is an excellent martial art for self-defence. BJJ will teach you how to get an opponent down to the ground so you can get away from the fight. It will also teach you what to do if your attacker takes you down to the ground and tries to get on top of you.

In BJJ there’s a lot of focus on how to escape from disadvantageous positions, like when you’re stuck under someone. These techniques are crucial in a self-defence situation. There’s also a lot of focus on getting yourself into a dominant position so you can overpower your attacker and get out of the fight.

BJJ is one of the best martial arts for self-defence because when the techniques are performed well they can work for a person of any size, no matter how big their attacker is. BJJ was specifically developed so that smaller fighters could overpower larger fighters. So, BJJ is the ideal martial art for smaller people, especially women, who are interested in learning how to escape from an attack.

2. Muay Thai

Muay Thai is a striking martial art that focuses on how you can use all of your limbs as weapons against an opponent or an attacker. Unlike boxing, which only uses hand strikes, Muay Thai techniques include punches, kicks, knees, and elbows.

Training Muay Thai will give you an understanding of how you can strike an attacker to do the maximum amount of damage. It will also teach you how you can use strikes to keep your attacker at a distance so they can’t get their hands on you.

Muay Thai relies heavily on different styles of kicks, which is the primary way that Muay Thai fighters keep their opponents away from them. In a self-defence situation, you can use kicks like the teep and the rear leg kick to inflict damage on your attacker while keeping them away from you so they don’t hurt you and so that you have the space to run away.

Muay Thai will also teach you how to effectively use punches to disable an attacker. Though any punch will hurt your opponent, aiming punches at specific parts of the body will do more damage, which creates the space and time for you to get out of a dangerous situation. Training Muay Thai will also teach you how to combine several styles of punches to overwhelm your attacker with strikes.

Muay Thai is an excellent martial art for self-defence because it teaches you how to most efficiently use your strikes to harm an attacker.

3. MMA (Mixed Martial Arts)

The best way to be prepared for a self-defence situation is to be prepared to fight standing with strikes and on the ground with grappling. While this can be accomplished by training BJJ and Muay Thai separately, taking a Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) class will help you put all the techniques together in a way that most closely resembles a real self-defence situation.

In a Mixed Martial Arts class you’ll focus on standing and striking, grappling on the ground, and striking on the ground. Since BJJ doesn’t involve striking and Muay Thai doesn’t involve striking on the ground, MMA is the best way to learn about how to efficiently use strikes once an attacker has gotten you on the ground.

An MMA class also focuses heavily on identifying the situations where each martial art is most effective. It will teach you when it makes more sense to keep the fight standing and when it makes more sense to take your attacker down to the ground. It will also teach you to identify which techniques to use to subdue your attacker, damage your attacker, and create space so you can get out of danger.

Many MMA classes have a sparring component, which simulates a real fight in a safe situation. This will allow you to practice all the techniques you’ve learned so that you’ll be confident enough to use them in an actual self-defence situation.

What Martial Art Should I Learn for Self-Defence?

So, the answer to the question, “What martial art should I learn for self-defence” is actually that you should learn multiple martial arts to make sure you’re prepared for anything an attacker throws at you.

If you only have the time or capacity to learn one martial art, take an MMA class so you can learn the basics of standing and ground fighting. If you can handle it, you should definitely take some BJJ and Muay Thai classes as well.

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