Color Belts

Rankings in martial arts practice are typically indicated by the belt one wears with their uniform. The infamous martial arts ranking is the black belt. In order to get to black belt, one must first go through the color belt rankings.

The color belt rankings are often referred to KYU or GUP, depending on the discipline one is learning. There generally 8 to 10 color belt rankings, the majority of which start with the white belt. Assuming a martial arts school has 10 color belt rankings, these would go in order of 10th KYU/GUP, 9th KYU/GUP, 8th KYU/GUP, 7th KYU/GUP, 6th KYU/GUP, 5th KYU/GUP, 4th KYU/GUP, 3rd KYU/GUP, 2nd KYU/GUP, 1st KYU/GUP. What then follows then is the 1st degree, 1st DAN black belt.

The actual colors of the belts, and the number of rankings, depend highly on the martial arts discipline, and particular school.

A typically ranking for a Japanese Karate school might be White belt, Yellow belt, Orange belt, Green belt, Purple belt, Blue belt, First stripe Brown belt, Second stripe Brown belt, Third stripe Brown belt, 1st degree black belt.

A typically ranking for a Korean Tae Kwon Do school might be White belt, White belt with Yellow stripe, Yellow belt, Yellow belt with Green stripe, Green belt, Green belt with Blue stripe, Blue belt, Blue belt with Red stripe, Red belt, Red belt with Black stripe, 1st degree black belt.

Chinese Kung Fu disciplines tend to use Sashes rather than belts. The belt rankings aren't traditional is the thousand year old Kung Fu disciplines, but have been adopted as this a part of modern martial arts practice. The end with Black Sash, but the actual colors used vary quiet a bit.