Illegal techniques by belt and age: the IBJJF table

The document is called Technical Fouls & Illegal Moves, it's published by the IBJJF, and the version in force as we write is dated 1 January 2024. It lists 26 techniques and, for each, the categories where it's banned. It applies to IBJJF events: other federations draw the lines differently, and we come back to that at the end.

The six categories

• 4 to 12 years old — all ranks.
• 13 to 15 years old — all ranks.
• 16 and 17 years old (all ranks) and adult white belts (Adult to Master 7). Both sit in the same column: a teenager and an adult at their first competition have identical limits.
• Adult to Master 7, blue and purple belts.
• Adult to Master 7, brown and black belts, excluding adult no-gi.
• Adult brown and black belts, no-gi. The category with the fewest bans: some techniques exist only here.

Banned for everyone, no exceptions

Six techniques are prohibited in every category, from the youngest kid to the no-gi black belt. They aren't holds: they're ways of hurting someone.

• Slam — lifting and dropping your opponent onto the mat.
• Spinal lock without a choke.
• Scissor takedown.
• Bending fingers backwards.
• Grabbing the belt and throwing the opponent onto their head while defending a single leg, when their head is on the outside of your body.
• Suplex landing on the opponent's head or neck.

Brown and black only, and only in no-gi

Four techniques stay banned for everyone except adult brown and black belts competing without the gi. It's the biggest single difference between the two rulesets, and the reason a no-gi competitor and a gi competitor aren't describing the same sport.

• Heel hook.
• Locks twisting the knee.
• Knee reaping — detailed below.
• Toe hold with outward pressure on the foot.

From brown belt, in the gi too

• Bicep slicer and calf slicer.
• Knee bar.
• Toe hold (the permitted version, not the outward-pressure one).
• Straight foot lock turning in the direction of the foot not under attack.

From blue belt

Three techniques are banned for kids, teens, 16-17 year olds and adult white belts, and become legal at blue:

• Locks inside the closed guard compressing kidneys or ribs.
• Wrist locks.
• Single leg takedown with your head on the outside of the opponent's body. ⚠️ The rulebook footnotes this one: it is a prohibited technique, but the athlete is not penalised.

From 16 years old, at any rank

Seven techniques are banned only in the two youngest categories (4-12 and 13-15) and become legal from sixteen, even for a white belt:

• Choke with spinal lock
• Straight foot lock
• Ezequiel (forearm choke using the sleeve)
• Frontal guillotine choke
• Omoplata
• Triangle pulling the head
• Arm triangle

And exactly one technique is banned in the 4-12 bracket alone: submissions that stretch the legs apart.

Knee reaping, as the rulebook actually defines it

It's the entry that causes the most arguments, because it isn't a grip but a position of the leg. Knee reaping happens when an athlete places their thigh behind the opponent's leg and passes the calf over the body above the knee, beyond the vertical midline, applying pressure on the knee from outside to inside while the foot of the endangered leg stays trapped between hip and armpit.

• The foot doesn't have to be held to count as trapped. If one athlete is standing and bearing weight on the foot of the same leg as the knee in danger, that foot is considered trapped.
• Severe foul when the foot crosses the opponent's body limit, or when either athlete already has a submission hold.
• Serious foul when the foot crosses the vertical midline of the body: the referee stops the match, restores the position and penalises.
• For brown and black belts the referee does not interrupt and no penalty applies.

What this table doesn't cover

It's IBJJF and nothing else. ADCC and AJP draw different lines — which is why an athlete used to one federation gets disqualified in another for something that was legal at home. We covered the differences between the three here, and how a tournament works from registration to podium here.

Source: IBJJF, *Technical Fouls & Illegal Moves*, in force since 1 January 2024, and the *Rule Book* v6.1 (June 2024). If the rules change, this page gets re-read: an out-of-date ban is worse than no information.