Judo gokyo: all 40 Kodokan throws in 5 groups

The judo gokyo (gokyo no waza, "techniques of the five teachings") is the Kodokan's official list of 40 throws, arranged in five groups of eight. Since its 1920 revision it has been the backbone of how standing judo is taught. Below you will find the full table with a link to every technique, followed by a practical way to learn it on the mat.

What the judo gokyo contains

The gokyo is made up only of throws, the nage-waza. Pins, chokes and armlocks belong to a separate classification, ground work or katame-waza. That is why you will not find kesa-gatame or juji-gatame in this table.

Each group is called a kyo: dai ikkyo (first group), dai nikyo, dai sankyo, dai yonkyo and dai gokyo. The "Family" column gives the Kodokan's technical classification. Te-waza are hand techniques and koshi-waza hip techniques. Ashi-waza use the legs and feet. Ma-sutemi-waza are rear sacrifices and yoko-sutemi-waza side sacrifices.

The 40 gokyo techniques

That makes 14 ashi-waza, 9 koshi-waza, 6 te-waza, 3 ma-sutemi-waza and 8 yoko-sutemi-waza. The meanings are literal. Most describe an action such as reaping or sweeping, or an image like a wheel or a valley.

History of the gokyo from 1895 to 1920

Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo, published the first gokyo in 1895 at the Kodokan, his school in Tokyo. It had 42 techniques. In 1920 the Kodokan revised it. Some throws were removed, others added, and the list took its current shape of 40 throws in five groups of eight.

The throws dropped in 1920 did not vanish. The Kodokan later recognized them in a supplementary list, alongside newer techniques. That is the case for throws you see in competition without finding them in the gokyo, such as sode-tsurikomi-goshi, the hip throw with a two-sleeve grip.

There is no need to go further into the history here. The history of judo page tells it in more detail.

Why this order

The general idea is progression. The first group gathers throws where uke falls fairly naturally and tori learns the basics of off-balancing: foot sweeps, big hip throws, reaps. Further down the list, techniques ask for more timing, more commitment or better breakfalls. The fifth group is full of sacrifice throws (sutemi-waza), where tori drops to the mat with uke.

This logic has limits. Uchi-mata sits in the second group and is one of the hardest throws to do well. Uki-goshi, in the first, has almost disappeared from modern competition. The gokyo is a study program, not an effectiveness ranking.

Our view: respect it like a grammar, but do not mistake it for a randori plan. A beginner who wants to score in competition gains more from mastering two first-group throws than from reciting all eight of the fifth.

What the gokyo leaves out

Several things you will see at your club are not on the list:

• ground techniques, classified as katame-waza;
• one-arm or kneeling variants such as ippon-seoi-nage or seoi-otoshi, treated as forms or close relatives;
• modern throws recognized later by the Kodokan;
• principles: kuzushi, tsukuri and kake, kumikata (gripping) and ukemi (breakfalls) are not techniques, yet none of the 40 work without them.

The gokyo is not a kata either. The formal sequence that presents a selection of throws is the nage-no-kata. People mix the two up because they share techniques.

How to learn the gokyo without reciting it

This method works well for adults and has four steps.

First, learn the names by family rather than by group. O-soto-gari, ko-soto-gari and ko-soto-gake stick together because they all attack the leg from the outside. The table above gives you the family of each throw.

Second, run through the gokyo as uchi-komi once a month. Eight techniques per session, ten reps on each side, no throwing. The goal is to feel the difference in placement between neighboring techniques.

Third, throw. Pick four techniques from the group you are working on and do them as nage-komi on a thick crash mat. You will quickly see which ones you can really do.

Finally, choose. Keep one forward throw, one backward throw and one that goes to the side. Those are the ones you hunt for in randori. The rest of the gokyo becomes vocabulary: you understand it when someone uses it on you, and you know how to counter it.

One last piece of advice. Each month, write down which gokyo throws you actually landed in randori, in a notebook or in the Jutrack training log. After a season the list is usually shorter than you thought. That is good news, because it tells you where to put your hours.