Both of these art forms are considered as martial arts. The meaning of martial arts derives from a Chinese character “Mu”. It means avoiding a fight or put down weapons. The art, it means the skill, expression and the creativity. So, the real meaning of martial arts is avoiding or stop a fight with a skillful or in a creative way. In a single word it means ‘Peace’.
What is boxing?
Boxing is a sport or a practice which use fists with protective gloves, and it is a combat sport. Usually they fight in a roped square ring.
What is karate?
Karate is an unarmed combat system which use hands, legs to attack or defend the opponents. The real meaning of karate comes with two words which is “kara” means the empty and “te” means the hand. So basically, karate means the Empty hand.
History of boxing and karate
Boxing
The oldest art form from these two art forms is boxing. Its date back to Egypt around 3000 BC. It has introduced to the ancient Olympic Games by the Greeks in the 7th century BC as a sport.
Later in roman these matches were ended up with a death of a competitor. Because they have used metals to the gloves as a replacement for leather. With the fall of the Roman Empire this metal gloves boxing came to an end.
There are some records of fist fighting sport between 12th century -17th century in some different cities and in provinces in Italy. The sport was popular as the ‘’Fist Fighting’’
In the 16th century this fist fighting was regenerated as bare Knuckle fighting in England. As for the records the first bare knuckle fight appeared in 1681 in the London.
The introduction of weight classes
The Boxing got a new face in the 17th century in England as amateur boxing. It was categorized according to five weight classes. They are Bantam, Feather, Light, Middle and Heavy weight.
In the Bantam, the weight should be less than 54kg, In the Feather category the weight should be less than 57kg , In the Light the weight should be less than 63.5kg, In the middle category the weight should be less than 73kg and in the heavy category the weight can be any.
The first rule was introduced in the 1743 by champion Jack Broughton. It was named as Broughton’s rules.
Boxing on Olympics games
When Boxing entered to the modern Olympics with the new face in 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis, USA was the only country which took all the medals. After that motivation Americans continue to dominate boxing. Boxing was in the Olympic Games until today except in 1912.
The new rules were introduced to this sport since in 1980s and made this martial art form more popular as a sport in the world. The women’s boxing was introduced in the 2012 Olympic games.
Nowadays boxing is one of the most famous sport in the world.
Karate
Many believes that karate is generated in 2000 years before. But for the lack of written history about karate the evolution of ancient karate cannot be founded. In the 17th century karate was generated with the motivation of samurai rules.
The history of present karate form is traced back to 17th century. The Birthplace of karate is known as in Okinawa.
There was a time which have all weapons was banned in Japan. So, there was a need of an unarmed combat system.
Therefore, they developed an art form which they can fight without any weapon.
They tried some defensive and attackable unarmed tactics. As a result of that the karate was generated as a full package of unarmed combat systems to survive.
At that time this art form was called as Tode. It was a reference to a visitor named Kushanku from China who taught kung fu and he was the one who introduced the first kata named kankudai, and it was the first version of that kata. After that, the Tode style was blended with other martial art forms on an island named as “Te”.
In the island named “Te” there was three popular cities which named as Shuri, Naha and Tamarai. These three cities had their own way of practicing martial arts.
The modern Karate styles named Shotokan and Shito-Ryu are influenced by the styles of Shuri and Tamarai cities. The Goju-Ryu style has influenced by the city Naha.
In the 20th century began teaching Te in Okinawa schools. This helped to the expansion of the art form of “Te”. Sensei Gichin Funakoshi was the one who introduced this art to the japan in 1922.
This is the time where this art form was get modified by the sensei Funakoshi. He made more modifications to make this more accessible to the Japanese. As a result of that the “Te” art form was named as Karate. Sensei Funakoshi was the founding member of Japanese karate do Association (JKA). This was the turning point of karate and this was the start that karate got known to the whole world.
Division of karate
Today the karate has divided in to three parts.
They are Traditional karate, modern karate and sports karate.
- Traditional karate is which comes with old Okinawan karate style. It is a full contact art.
- The modern karate is developed and modified art form from the traditional karate style and it is also a full contact art form.
- The sports karate is more about competition and also scoring points. Basically, it is all about competitive side of Karate.
The Characteristic features in boxing
In boxing to be a great boxer there have some characteristic features which must develop by the artist.
They are the quickness, punching accuracy, punching power, defence, discipline, guts and intelligence.
The boxers fight in a ring and when they step into the ring, the quickness is the most important thing to a boxer for the survival in that ring.
In this sport, more you get slower more you get hit in the ring.
In boxing always required to punch a moving target. The more you miss the punches you throw more you get expend in a fight.
So always a boxer should concern about the accuracy of the punching. The power of a punch must be always consider in this sport.
To gain the power the athlete should do workouts in a gym like lifting weights and power training.
Defence is to survive in the ring from the opponent by protecting the areas which the opponent could hurt you most. Every sport teaches people the disciplines and give guts to face to our fears and problems. The intelligence is a small science in boxing to identify the weakness of the opponent and when to attack and when to get covered.
The Characteristic Features in Karate
Karate is a very peaceful art and Karate is a striking art which strikes with hands, legs, elbows and knees too.
There is a part which is named as ‘’kata”. Kata is like a meditation and it helps to keep the mind calm even the artist in a tough situation. There are seven main qualities.
They are the technique, power, speed, focus, distance, timing and awareness.
In karate there are more trainings to perfect the techniques because the art form is depending on the techniques. When the techniques are perfect, they concern about the power. The karate players are good at power punches and kicks, for that they do lots of power trainings to develop their muscle power.
When they become good at the power they are going to the next step which named as speed.
A karate player should be much quicker than a normal sportsman and their punches and kicks should be quicker.
Therefore, they do speed trainings in their training sessions. In karate with meditations and katas teach to keep mind calm always and stay focus. It helps to survive any situation in life.
A good practitioner knows when to attack and when to defence. It is gained by the practise of this art form and they always concern about the surrounding. Karate teach to respect others. That is why they bow even to the opponent.
Differences between Boxing and Karate
Comparatively Karate is having more techniques to master when considering the techniques that are needed in Boxing.
Therefore, it takes more time to learn Karate, but having more techniques is also a positive point as a person can gain the knowledge on variable techniques.
However, there are few techniques in Boxing, one can learn them by spending more time and develop those few techniques up to the maximum level.
In boxing however there are few techniques to practice, it solely involves punches and evasive moves. Boxing uses punching techniques exclusively, Karate uses numerous types of techniques of defence, and also attacking techniques using legs, arms and entire body.
Karate vs boxing difference on training equipment
One can practice Karate with or without training equipment and can practice and train alone. But in boxing there must be some equipment for training, such as the heavy bag, the speed bag, the jump rope, gloves and weights and many more including a partner to practice with.
Is better Karate or boxing on multiple attacks?
There are techniques in Karate that teaches to fight with multiple opponents and make the person ready to defend at any moment. But in Boxing, the players involve in fighting with only a single opponent.
When considering about the place of practicing these arts, Karate is practiced in a room called dojo by the Sensei and Boxing is practiced in a gym or club where the coach teaches.
Karate grading system vs no grading system on boxing
In karate there is a grading system. That grading system is follows in 10 kyus. That’s why every karate player is wearing a belt according to their level.
These belts are represents the level of a practitioner.
A karate practitioner start the journey by wearing a white belt and with the practises and endless efforts the white belt transform into black.
In this journey there is 6 colours of belts to achieve.
They are
- white belt
- yellow belt
- orange belt
- blue belt
- green belt
- brown belt
- black belt.
In each kyu they are testing the progress of the practitioner to achieve the next belt and the next kyu.
Black belt is not the end of the journey it’s the start of the journey to go deep. In black belt also there are 10 levels to achieve according to the experiences and the progression of the practitioner.
That’s why karate called as a lifelong practise.
But in boxing we cannot see these kinds of grading systems or a progression level in practises. They test their progress in the tournaments.
Boxing is a very aggressive sport when they are in the ring. Not like other sports in karate they always respecting to the opponent. That’s why in precepts of karate we can see a precepts that telling “karate practitioner is always start with a bow and end with a bow”. As mentioned in above karate is a full package of martial arts because a karate practitioner is a self-controlled person because it taught in the art by the meditations and katas. We cannot see that kind of self-control in boxing and there are no meditations and katas in the practise of boxing.
Similarities between Boxing and Karate
Both martial arts are considered as Olympic games and they have sets of rules and regulations. The fights take place with the direct contact between the opponents in Olympic.
It is an important factor that not to fight without proper training because the punches and techniques learned by the martial artists can cause serious injuries.
Many people around the world assume that a more powerful punch as a better technique, but in a fight, the way a person use the punch, the situation and the correct timing is more important than how hard a person can hit.
That is why it is said that a player must master the techniques in the learning martial art. Whether it is Boxing or Karate, practicing the techniques is an important factor that is in common.
Both martial art forms require patience and high level of concentration. Specially must have good knowledge to understand the movements of the opponent in both games.
Both arts help to improve the mental health. During hitting in Boxing the body secretes higher levels of endorphins (good mood hormones) and that will be helpful to get rid of sadness and anger. In Karate, it helps a lot to concentrate and calm down the moods.
Which art form is the best, Boxing or Karate?
As a martial art karate is a complete art form which has all the abilities to avoid a fight or to survive a situation.
In boxing they are mastering punches only, but boxing can be dangerous
, but boxing can be dangerous
. In the real-life situations most of the people know only to throw punches but it will not help to take down the opponent.
The boxing punches are technically practiced so they differ from those punches which are not technical. Both the martial art forms have unique and distinct styles of punching, their own characteristic features that causes these arts to be differ from one another.
There are many variables between karate and boxing. So, depending on them and depending on your preferences you can choose your martial art as it is impossible to tell one is better over the other.
Every martial art is a good art form. Nothing beats one another because it depends on the practitioners training. Such as physical fitness, endurance, speed, power etc.
So, we cannot say that one martial art form is better than any other martial form. And that applies to this situation also.
So, one cannot say the best martial art form out of Boxing and Karate.
When it comes to a professional fight between a boxing player and a karate player, the outcome of the match would be decided by the attacks and the combination of self-defence, their experience, their fighting spirit along with the practice.
In such a fight, there will be a positive impact on the Karate player as there are more amount of techniques used in Karate and on the other hand a boxing player would have a benefit as he has mastered the few techniques that the Boxing is having.
Therefore, in such a fight between a Boxing player and Karate player, the practice is the main thing that will be helpful, same as in all the fights.