A popular martial arts myth says students of ancient arts began training with simple white belts that became dirtier and darker as they trained, the deepening color signifying a deepening of knowledge and skills. Today, the belts in karate progress through colors that also represent a student's growing knowledge and accomplishments. Color belt ranks progress from 10 to one. Once the student reaches black belt, they progress upward from first to tenth degree.
Novice Student Belts
Novice student belts are white, yellow and orange. Some schools reverse the order from orange to yellow, but white is always first, representing purity and innocence.
Intermediate Belts
Intermediate belts order is green, blue and purple. These belts represent an important growth period during which the student builds on the foundation of basic knowledge from the novice belt training.
Advanced Belts
The advanced belts order is brown and red. In some schools, red may come before brown. These ranks represent a near mastery of basic techniques supplemented by a growing knowledge and proficiency of advanced skills.
Black Belts
The black belt is a master of basic techniques with an expanding repertoire of advanced techniques and a hungry learning spirit. The first degree black belt is not a symbol of karate mastery but of a new beginning stage in which the student strives for mastery. Each degree of black belt represents another further step toward that mastery.
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