The main types of guard in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

Guard is any position where you are underneath or seated and your legs are between you and your opponent. It is the idea that makes Brazilian Jiu Jitsu unusual: in most grappling, being on your back is losing, and here it is a place you can attack from.

The families below are sorted by the thing that actually distinguishes them — how they manage the distance between you and the person trying to get past.

Closed guard

Legs wrapped around their waist, ankles crossed behind their back. They cannot move away, you can break their posture, and it is the guard almost everybody learns first.

What it is good at: control, sweeps, attacks on the arms and neck, and buying time. It is also the most forgiving guard to have while you are learning, because the person cannot simply walk around your legs.

Its limit: a good passer opens it, and everything after that is open guard whether you have practised one or not.

Half guard

One of their legs trapped between yours; the rest of them is past your other leg. Half guard used to be taught as a position you had failed into, and it is now understood as one of the deepest offensive guards in the sport.

What it is good at: sweeps, back takes, and working against much heavier partners, because you can be tight to them rather than holding weight at arm’s length.

Its limit: it is genuinely bad if you are flat on your back with their chest on yours. The whole position depends on being on your side with a frame or an underhook.

Butterfly guard

Seated, with the tops of your feet hooked inside their thighs. A close-range, upright guard rather than a lying-down one.

What it is good at: elevating and sweeping somebody who is kneeling in front of you. It is a strong no-gi position because it does not depend on fabric.

Its limit: it does not work well against a standing passer, and if they flatten you, you are no longer in butterfly guard.

The open guard family

Everything where your legs are not locked and not trapping a leg. This is the largest group and it is where most of modern Brazilian Jiu Jitsu lives. The common members:

• Feet on hips or knees — the plain version, and the foundation. Your legs act as a barrier that manages distance.
• De la Riva — hooking your outside leg around the outside of their lead leg. Very common in the gi, used in no-gi too.
• Reverse de la Riva — the mirror, hooking on the inside, often used against a knee-cut pass.
• X-guard and single-leg X — underneath them, controlling one of their legs from below. Strong sweeping positions in both gi and no-gi.
• Spider guard — feet on their biceps while gripping their sleeves. Gi only; it does not exist without sleeves.
• Lasso guard — one leg wrapped around their arm with a sleeve grip. Gi only.
• Collar-sleeve — one hand on the collar, one on the sleeve, one foot on the hip. Gi only.

That gi-only marking matters more than beginners expect. A guard game built entirely on sleeve and collar grips evaporates the first time you train without a jacket, which is one of the real differences between gi and no-gi.

What all of them share

Underneath the variety, every guard is doing the same three jobs:

Managing distance. Either they are too far away to pass or too close to move. The middle is where guards get passed.

Keeping you facing them. Every guard fails the moment you end up turned away, which is why being passed is usually a posture problem rather than a guard problem.

Threatening something. A guard with no attacks is a delaying action. The sweeps and submissions are not decoration — they are what stops the other person passing at their leisure.

Which should a beginner use?

Whichever your academy teaches. That is not a dodge: the guard your coach drills is the one you will get corrections on, see demonstrated weekly, and have partners who understand.

If you have a free choice, the usual order is closed guard first, because it is the most forgiving and it teaches grips, posture-breaking and the basic idea of control. Then half guard, because it is where you will end up anyway and because it works when you are tired. Then open guard, which is where you will spend most of the rest of your Brazilian Jiu Jitsu life.

Two things not to do early. Do not collect guards — three guards played badly is worse than one played adequately. And do not choose one from watching competition footage; the guards that look best on video tend to be the ones that require the most precision to hold.

Choosing one for your game

Around blue belt this stops being a question about techniques and starts being a question about you. Body type matters — long legs suit distance guards, shorter and stronger builds often prefer close ones like half and butterfly. So does what you enjoy, which is not a trivial consideration when the timescale is years.

The useful framing is not “which guard is best” but “which guard connects to the positions I already reach”, which is the whole logic of building a game rather than collecting techniques. And whichever you pick, it sits underneath the same rule everything else does: position first, attacks after.

Common questions

How many guards do I need? One you trust, plus half guard because you will land there. Two is plenty for several years.

Is closed guard outdated? No. It is less dominant at the highest levels of competition and it remains one of the most useful positions in training, in no-gi, and in self-defence.

Why does my guard work on some people and not others? Usually distance and size. Guards that depend on holding somebody at range struggle against people who are strong at closing it.

Can I use gi guards in no-gi? The ones built on sleeve and collar grips, no. De la Riva, butterfly, X-guard and half guard all transfer.