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Judo

Two athletes, one in white and one in blue, four minutes on a square mat: a judo contest can end at once with one throw onto the back, and is easy to follow once you know its three scores.

A judo evening

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  1. Get it: how it works, in about 2 minutes.
  2. A final to watch: British Junior Championships 2023 Final Block Commentary, on British Judo's own channel, played in YouTube's player on its page.
  3. The videogames: others about judo.

Get it

Answered from this page's own claims, words and competitions, word for word, with their sources. Nothing about your question is kept.

New to judo about 2 minutes

What you are watching

  • Judo is a Japanese martial art and Olympic sport, created by Kanō Jigorō in 1882. Its name means "gentle way".10
  • Two athletes, one in a white judogi and one in a blue one, meet on a square contest area 8 to 10 metres a side, with a safety area at least 3 metres wide around it.21
  • Each tries to throw the other onto the back, to hold them down on the mat, or to make them give up with a choke or an arm lock. In competition the only joint lock allowed is on the elbow.10

The three scores

  • There are three scores. On the scoreboard an ippon counts 100, a waza-ari 10 and a yuko 1.1
  • Ippon is a throw onto the back with speed, force and control to the end of the landing. A throw that falls short of that, landing past 90 degrees of the shoulder line but not on the back, is waza-ari.1
  • A yuko is a lesser landing: on the side or turned towards the front, on the upper back, or on the buttocks. Yuko are counted one by one but never add up to a waza-ari.1
  • On the ground, a hold-down (osaekomi) scores yuko after 5 seconds, waza-ari after 10 and ippon at 20. An athlete who taps twice with hand or foot, or says "maitta", gives up: ippon to the other.1

How a contest is won

  • A senior contest lasts 4 minutes of real contest time. An ippon, or a second waza-ari, ends it at once; otherwise the technical scores decide when the 4 minutes are up.1
  • If neither has scored, or the scores are equal, golden score follows: it has no time limit, the scores and shido stay on the board, and the first score of any kind wins.1
  • A shido, for a small infringement, never gives the opponent a score. The third shido is hansoku-make: disqualification, and the opponent wins the contest by ippon. A grave act can draw hansoku-make at once.1

What to watch for

  • The grip fight (kumi-kata): once an athlete has a normal grip, they have 45 seconds to attack. False attacks, stepping out on purpose, and grabbing or touching the legs from the top of the inner thigh down all draw shido.1
  • Safety comes first: an athlete who lands in a bridge, head and feet on the mat, to avoid falling on the back concedes ippon, and diving head first into a throw is hansoku-make.1
Following it about 4 minutes

From the draw to the medals

  • Each weight category is a knockout bracket. Up to eight athletes are seeded from the world ranking list, so that the top two should not meet before the final.2
  • At the Olympic Games and on the World Judo Tour, athletes beaten in the quarter-finals go to the repechage. Its two winners each meet a beaten semi-finalist from the other half, and both winners of those contests take bronze.2

The mixed team event

  • A mixed team is three women and three men, in six categories: women -57, -70 and +70 kg, men -73, -90 and +90 kg. Each contest lasts 4 minutes.2
  • The first team to win a majority of the contests, normally four of the six, wins the match. At equal wins, a category drawn by computer fights a golden score contest to decide it.211

Scoring details

  • In golden score, a hold-down ends the contest after 5 seconds, with a yuko.1
  • As a rule, one referee, from a different nation than both athletes, runs the contest. Supervisors at the table talk to the referee by radio, follow on a video replay system (CARE), and must review every decision that ends a contest.1
  • The yuko score came in with the rules first used at the Paris Grand Slam in February 2025. From the Ulaanbaatar Grand Slam in June 2026, the refereeing rules stay fixed until the Los Angeles 2028 Games.456

The season

  • The IJF World Judo Tour is made up of Grand Prix, Grand Slams, the Masters and the World Championships for seniors, juniors and cadets, plus an open-weight World Championships. The IJF has held a World Championships every year since 2009; in 2026 Baku hosted it, with the individual events from 4 to 10 October and the mixed teams on 11 October.2879
  • Results earn world ranking points: first place is worth 700 at a Grand Prix, 1000 at a Grand Slam, 1800 at the Masters, 2000 at the World Championships and 2200 at the Olympic Games. Points count in full for 12 months, at half for the next 12, then expire.26
  • The Masters invites the top 36 of the ranking in each category. For Los Angeles 2028, qualification runs from 15 June 2026 to 12 June 2028, and the top 17 of the ranking in each category qualify directly, at most one per country.23
  • The Olympic programme has seven categories for men, seven for women and the mixed team, with 372 athletes in Paris 2024 and 372 places for Los Angeles 2028. Judo has been Olympic for men since Tokyo 1964 and for women since Barcelona 1992.113810

Weight categories

Women -48 kg
Extra-lightweight: up to and including 48.0 kg.2
Women -52 kg
Half-lightweight: over 48.0 kg, up to and including 52.0 kg.2
Women -57 kg
Lightweight: over 52.0 kg, up to and including 57.0 kg.2
Women -63 kg
Half-middleweight: over 57.0 kg, up to and including 63.0 kg.2
Women -70 kg
Middleweight: over 63.0 kg, up to and including 70.0 kg.2
Women -78 kg
Half-heavyweight: over 70.0 kg, up to and including 78.0 kg.2
Women +78 kg
Heavyweight: over 78.0 kg.2
Men -60 kg
Extra-lightweight: up to and including 60.0 kg.2
Men -66 kg
Half-lightweight: over 60.0 kg, up to and including 66.0 kg.2
Men -73 kg
Lightweight: over 66.0 kg, up to and including 73.0 kg.2
Men -81 kg
Half-middleweight: over 73.0 kg, up to and including 81.0 kg.2
Men -90 kg
Middleweight: over 81.0 kg, up to and including 90.0 kg.2
Men -100 kg
Half-heavyweight: over 90.0 kg, up to and including 100.0 kg.2
Men +100 kg
Heavyweight: over 100.0 kg.2
Mixed team
Three women (-57, -70 and +70 kg) and three men (-73, -90 and +90 kg); at the Olympic Games each team place takes athletes from three individual categories.23
Open-weight
No weight limit, for senior and junior women and men; it has its own World Championships Open and is not among the Olympic events.23
The words
Judogi
The judo uniform of jacket, trousers and belt; in a contest one athlete wears white and the other blue.110
Hajime
"Begin!": the referee's call to start or restart the contest.1
Mate
"Wait!": the referee's call to stop the contest for a moment.1
Ippon
The top score, which ends the contest: a throw onto the back with speed, force and control, a 20-second hold-down, or a submission.1
Waza-ari
The middle score; a second one in the same contest makes ippon.1
Yuko
The smallest score, added for the rules first used in February 2025; yuko never add up to a waza-ari.14
Osaekomi
"Hold is on!": the call when one athlete holds the other down with the back on the mat; the hold is timed from then.1
Shido
A penalty for a small infringement; it gives no score, and the third one is hansoku-make.1
Hansoku-make
Disqualification, after three shido or for a grave infringement; the opponent wins by ippon.1
Golden score
Extra time with no limit when the scores are level after 4 minutes; the first score wins.1
Kumi-kata
Gripping: how an athlete takes hold of the opponent's judogi, by sleeve, collar, chest, shoulder or back.1
Ne-waza
Groundwork, once both athletes have two knees on the mat; work standing up is tachi-waza.1
Tori and uke
Tori performs a technique; uke is the one it is done to.10
Repechage
A second chance for athletes beaten in the quarter-finals, who can still fight for a bronze medal.2

Sources

Facts from the governing body's pages are stated in this site's own words. The claims that cite Wikipedia are adapted (changed) from the cited articles, and those claims are offered under CC BY-SA 4.0.

  1. IJF Refereeing Rules, Sport and Organisation Rules of the IJF (Version 21.01.2026, ENG), International Judo Federation (The official rules; nothing of it is copied here), read 2026-11-05
  2. IJF Sport and Organisation Rules (SOR), Version 14 August 2026, International Judo Federation (The official rules; nothing of it is copied here), read 2026-11-05
  3. Qualification System, Games of the XXXIV Olympiad – LA28: Judo (version as of 12 May 2026), International Judo Federation (The official rules; nothing of it is copied here), read 2026-11-05
  4. New Rules: What to Remember (17 December 2024), International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  5. Rules Confirmed Ahead of a New Season (6 January 2026), International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  6. Understanding the 2026 IJF World Ranking Season (19 January 2026), International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  7. A Packed 2026 Season Ahead for World Judo (30 October 2025), International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  8. History: timeline, International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  9. Calendar, International Judo Federation (© International Judo Federation; facts stated in this site's own words), read 2026-11-05
  10. Judo, Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), read 2026-11-05
  11. Judo at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), read 2026-11-05
  12. judo (Q11420), Wikidata (CC0), read 2026-11-05

Watch

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From British Judo Association, Deutscher Judo-Bund e.V, Federação Portuguesa de Judo, Fédération Française de Judo, International Judo Federation, Magyar Judo Szövetség, Antalyaspor Resmi İnternet Sitesi. T (its judo videos, by their own titles), ASC Göttingen von e.V (its judo videos, by their own titles), C. A. Huracán - Sitio Web Oficial (its judo videos, by their own titles), Club Atlético Lanús (its judo videos, by their own titles), Europske sveučilišne igre Zagreb-Rijeka 2016 (its judo videos, by their own titles), FC Barcelona Página Oficial del FC Barcelona (its judo videos, by their own titles), Flamengo (its judo videos, by their own titles), Fluminense Football Club (its judo videos, by their own titles), Higa TV Productions (its judo videos, by their own titles), International University Sports Federation (its judo videos, by their own titles), Turn- und Sport-Club Eintracht von 1848/95 Korporation zu Dortmund (its judo videos, by their own titles) and XVIII Juegos Bolivarianos (its judo videos, by their own titles).

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Elsewhere

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Later, dates to come

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