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    Grades

    One list per grade. Pick the grade you are working towards, tick the techniques as you learn them, and the bar shows how close you are.

    Sitting a formal grading? The examinations section transcribes the real exam forms.

    Kai grades (Scotland) · JudoScotland

    JudoScotland's Kai pathway: nine gradings for children aged 5 to 7, marked on one belt by a coloured stripe along its length rather than by a new belt each time. At 8 a Kai holder transfers into the Mon system above the bottom rung, which is what the equivalence between Kai and Mon grades is for. Kai is not centrally regulated: the syllabus below is JudoScotland's, but the belt colours are one club's and yours may differ.

    Kai stripe colours vary from club to club, and so does the way they are worn: some clubs run a stripe down the belt, others wrap a coloured tab at the end of it. The pathway exists to keep young children engaged and is not regulated centrally. These are Edinburgh Judo’s, which Esprit Judo also uses; Destination Judo differs slightly. Take the syllabus as JudoScotland’s and the belt as your club’s.

    Syllabus posters:1st to 3rd Kai4th to 6th Kai7th to 9th Kai

    Mon grades · British Judo Association

    The junior grading pathway of the British Judo Association: eighteen Mon grades from red to brown belt, transcribed from the official Junior Grading Programme pictorial guide. Each grade shows its full syllabus sheet; skills that are not single techniques (breakfalls, escapes, turnovers, grips, randori) are listed as printed.

    Syllabus posters:1st to 3rd Mon4th to 6th Mon7th to 9th Mon10th to 12th Mon

    Kyu grades (Scotland) · JudoScotland

    JudoScotland's Kyu grade pathway: six grades from red to brown belt, open to judoka from 14 years of age, transcribed from the official Kyu Grade Promotion Syllabus. Promotion is based on technical knowledge and understanding with no contest requirement; a structured Randori element grows through the grades.

    Competitive dan grades · British Judo Association

    The senior competitive pathway of the British Judo Association, 1st to 5th Dan, as it stands for promotions from 1 January 2026. The hundred techniques the Kodokan recognises are divided into five sets of twenty, one to a dan grade. A candidate demonstrates the whole set for the grade being taken, five techniques of their own choice from each set already passed, and then performance skills, where the technique is theirs to choose from any of the hundred: throws linked into combinations and counters, groundwork combined, escaped or entered, and standing judo carried into groundwork. Each grade below lists the techniques it can be examined on by name, which is its own twenty and every set beneath it; the performance sections range over all hundred. The examination itself, with its marks and pass marks, is in the examinations section, one form per grade. Judo that is graded on a technical rather than competitive pathway reaches the same grades by a different examination, which is not yet transcribed here. The BJA replaced its 1982 scheme, built on 67 techniques, to teach the wider Kodokan curriculum and to bring its dan grade policy into line with IJF policy.