The directory sorted by sport. Each discipline briefly explained: what it is, what a class looks like and what it costs, alongside the list of Norwegian clubs that have it on the timetable.
18 disciplines are listed by Norwegian clubs today. Open one for the clubs that have it, what it costs and answers to the most common questions.
81 clubs · 60 confirmed by the club
Brazilian jiu-jitsu is a grappling sport where you take your opponent down and control them on the ground until they give up. No punches, no kicks. That means you can train at full speed inside your first month without ever being hit. The belts take their time in return: ten years from white to black is perfectly normal.
24 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Submission grappling, often called submission wrestling, is fighting without strikes, where you force a tap with a choke or a joint lock. It looks like no-gi jiu-jitsu, but the competition rules are different and takedowns count for more.
23 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Traditional ju-jitsu is the Japanese ancestor of both judo and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, covering throws, locks, strikes and self-defence in a single system. In Norway it is often trained in the same club as judo.
22 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Judo is the Olympic throwing sport. You use your opponent's balance against them, put them on the ground, and often carry on with a pin, a choke or an arm lock. Norwegian judo clubs sit under the national judo federation and usually run classes for both children and adults.
19 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
No-gi is Brazilian jiu-jitsu without the uniform, in shorts and a rash guard. With no cloth to hold on to everything moves faster, and the grips look more like wrestling and submission grappling. Most BJJ clubs run both.
12 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Wrestling is the oldest mat sport there is, and the best schooling available in deciding where a fight takes place. Freestyle and Greco-Roman are competitive sports in their own right, but wrestling is also what settles most MMA fights.
119 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Taekwondo is the Korean kicking art and an Olympic sport, known for fast, high kicks. It is one of the biggest martial arts for children in Norway, with a clear belt system and clubs a long way outside the major cities.
94 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Karate is a Japanese striking art with a strong emphasis on form, precision and grading. Norwegian karate clubs mostly sit under the national martial arts federation, and often run the widest children's programme in town.
48 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Boxing is hands only, and technical precisely because of it. Footwork, distance and defence are the whole sport. Many clubs run fitness boxing with no sparring at all, for people who are only after the training.
34 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Kickboxing combines boxing with kicks, under rule sets such as K-1 and low kick. For most people it is the easiest way into stand-up martial arts: few rules to learn, and conditioning from the very first session.
25 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Muay Thai, or Thai boxing, uses fists, elbows, knees and shins, the “eight limbs”. Training is serious conditioning on top of technique, and you can keep at it for years without hard sparring if you have no plans to compete.
5 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Capoeira is Brazilian and half dance. Two players move against each other in a circle to live music, with kicks, evasions and acrobatics. The training builds mobility and rhythm more than it prepares you for a fight.
5 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Kung fu and wushu cover a wide field of Chinese styles, from form-based training to sanda, which is full contact with throws. There are few clubs in Norway, but the ones that exist tend to work across several styles at once.
61 clubs · 37 confirmed by the club
MMA puts striking, kicking, wrestling and submissions under one rule set. Most people who train MMA in Norway never compete. They train it because it is the most complete form of martial arts to learn.
57 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Self-defence courses are short and practical, often six to ten weeks, and are about getting away rather than winning a fight. Many clubs run separate courses for women, and those go quickly.
7 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Krav Maga is an Israeli self-defence system built to end a situation quickly rather than to compete in one. Training is scenario-based, and there is no grading shared across the different organisations.
13 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Aikido is about redirecting an attacker's force with throws and joint locks instead of meeting it. It is trained without competition, and progress is measured in technique and form rather than results.
1 clubs · all confirmed by the clubs
Kendo is Japanese swordsmanship with bamboo swords and armour. It is loud, formal and physically heavier going than it looks on video, and the clubs in Norway are small and tight-knit.
A discipline is listed for a club only when we read it off the club's own timetable, menu or an official federation listing. Where we found nothing, the tags are inferred from the type of club. Those are marked as inferred both in the listing and on the club page, and counted separately.
