BJJ Terminology: A Glossary for Beginners

Jiu-Jitsu has its own vocabulary, blending Portuguese, Japanese, and gym-specific slang that's built up over decades. None of it is complicated once someone explains it, but showing up without any context can make a first class feel like listening to a conversation in another language. Bookmark this page — you'll likely hear every term below within your first few weeks of training.

Gear and uniform

Gi — The traditional woven cotton uniform (jacket, pants, and belt) used in classical Jiu-Jitsu, similar in look to a judo uniform. Also called a kimono.

No-gi — Training or competing without the gi, typically in a rashguard and grappling shorts or spats. No-gi tends to move faster since there's no fabric to grip, and it emphasizes different control positions than gi training.

Rashguard — A tight-fitting athletic shirt, usually worn under a gi or on its own for no-gi training, that reduces mat burn and helps with hygiene.

Positions

Guard — A bottom position where you use your legs to control distance from an opponent, prevent them from passing to a more dominant position, and look for sweeps or submissions. Contrary to how it sounds, guard is an offensive position in BJJ, not a purely defensive one.

Mount — A dominant top position where you sit astride your opponent's torso, controlling their hips and chest with your weight while having both hands free to work.

Side control — A dominant top position where you pin your opponent perpendicular to their body, controlling their hips and shoulders from the side.

Back control (back mount) — Being positioned behind your opponent with your legs hooked around theirs (or "seatbelt" grip around their torso), widely considered the single most dominant position in BJJ because it's very difficult to escape and offers strong submission options.

Full guard, half guard, closed guard, open guard — Variations of guard describing exactly how your legs are controlling your opponent — from fully wrapped around them (closed) to controlling just one of their legs (half) to using your feet and shins without wrapping around them at all (open).

• Guard, mount, side control, and back control are the core positions you'll learn first
• Sweep = reversing from bottom to top; submission = a lock or choke that ends the roll
• Tap out early and often — it's how you signal "stop," not a sign of losing
• Rolling = live sparring; drilling = cooperative practice repetition

Actions and exchanges

Roll / rolling — The word for live sparring in BJJ. "We rolled for five rounds tonight" simply means five rounds of live practice against a resisting partner.

Drilling — Practicing a technique cooperatively and repeatedly with a partner who isn't resisting, so you can build muscle memory before adding live resistance.

Sweep — Reversing position from the bottom, typically turning a guard position into landing on top of your opponent.

Pass (guard pass) — Getting around an opponent's legs from their guard into a more dominant top position like side control or mount.

Submission — A joint lock (attacking a joint like the elbow, shoulder, or ankle) or a choke (restricting blood flow or air) that forces your opponent to tap out, ending the exchange. Common examples include the armbar, the triangle choke, and the rear-naked choke.

Tap out (tapping) — Physically tapping your partner, the mat, or saying "tap" out loud to signal that a submission has you caught and you need it released immediately. Always respected instantly by your training partner.

Escape — Getting out of a bad position (like being mounted or in side control) back to a neutral or favorable position, such as guard.

People and culture

Professor / coach — Common terms of address for a BJJ instructor, especially a black belt. "Professor" reflects the academic, ongoing-education feel of the art — you never stop being a student, no matter your rank.

Oss — An informal expression sometimes used to acknowledge respect, agreement, or effort in some gyms. It isn't universal across all academies and carries more weight in some traditions than others — follow your gym's specific culture on this one.

Belt / stripe — Adult rank progresses through white, blue, purple, brown, and black belts, with small stripes added along the way to mark incremental progress within a rank.

Learning the vocabulary is the easy part — the real education happens once you're actually drilling these positions with a partner. Our Fundamentals program was built to introduce every one of these terms in context, at a pace built for total beginners. Come try a free class and put the glossary to use.