Explained: Breaking rules, moves and format

From the streets of New York in the 1970s to the grand stage of the Olympic Games, breaking has charted a course not many would have thought was possible.

Breakdancing, as breaking is popularly known, is a form of dance sport that blends urban dance with remarkable athleticism, making it worthy of a spot in the Olympic programme.

And after its successful introduction at the 2018 Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires, breaking made its big Olympic Games debut at Paris 2024. However, the sport was excluded from the Olympic programme for Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.

Unlike its beginning on the streets, breaking has evolved into a proper dance sport, with a fixed set of rules that make for fair competition.

Breaking moves

Before we dive into the breakdancing rules, let’s look at the three basic elements that make up breaking – top rock, down rock and freeze.

Top rock refers to all moves that are performed while standing up - generally a combination of stylish hand movements and footwork whereas freeze is when the breaker comes to a standstill in an unusual position (on their head or hands) in the middle of their routine.

But the most crucial and often the highlight of the performance is the down rock, which involves all moves done on the floor. It features spins, footwork, transitions and, most importantly, power moves.

Power moves are a complex set of movements the breakers showcase by spinning their whole body on hands, elbows, back, head or shoulders. The gravity-defying, acrobatic movements require superior strength, balance and flexibility.

For instance, the air flare power move requires dancers to rotate their body, whilst upside down, while alternating their balance on either arm and moving in a circular path.

Meanwhile, flare is a common acrobatic move that is also done by gymnasts. It involves balancing the torso on alternating arms and swinging the legs underneath in circles.

Breakers combine all three elements in their routine on beats provided by a hip-hop DJ when facing each other in a one-on-one competition called a battle.

Breaking battle format

Athletes, or breakers, as they are called, go up against each other in a 1 vs 1 battle and take alternate turns or throw downs to perform their routines.

A battle generally features a fixed number of sets from all breakers. Most major competitions, like the Red Bull BC One, have either two or three throw downs until the final, which has three or five throw downs.

Moreover, each throw down cannot be longer than 60 seconds but there are no penalties for performing too short or too long.

Each battle is conducted in front of a panel of judges, which usually comprises respected dancers from the breaking community. The judges rate each performance on clearly defined criteria.

Breaking judging criteria

A minimum of three or more uneven number of judges score the battles on six criteria - creativity, personality, technique, variety, performativity and musicality.

Each parameter has different weightage in a battle, with technique, performativity and creativity constituting 60 per cent of the total score while variety, musicality and personality make up the remaining 40 per cent.

The judges submit their votes after each round and the breaker with the highest points is declared the winner.

At the 2018 Youth Olympics, the judging panel comprised five judges.

Breaking at Paris 2024

Breaking was added to the 2024 Paris Olympics medal programme, along with other youth-centric events like skateboarding, surfing and sport climbing, which form an integral part of today’s culture.

There were separate competitions for men and women, where the best 16 B-Boys and 16 B-Girls of the world faced off in solo battles.

Canada's Phil Wizard won the gold medal in the men's breaking category and was followed by French Dany Dann and USA's Victor on the podium.

Japanese B-Girl Ami became the first women’s breaking champion in Olympic history. Lithuania’s Nicka and Chinese artist 671 clinched silver and bronze, respectively.

Olympic breakdancing rules

There were two events in the breaking competition programme at the Paris 2024 Olympics: B-Girls, B-Boys. There were 17 athletes in the B-Girls event and 16 athletes in the B-Boys event.

Paris 2024 Olympics breaking competition format

Pre-qualifier

In the B-Girls event, the athlete seeded 16 and athlete seeded 17 battled each other. The winner of the pre-qualifier battle advanced to the round robin. The losing athlete was ranked 17th.

Round robin

There were four groups of four athletes each. Each athlete competed in three battles in the round robin. The group composition was determined based on pre-competition seeding:

• Group A: 1, 8, 9, 16/17
• Group B: 2, 7, 10, 15
• Group C: 3, 6, 11, 14
• Group D: 4, 5, 12, 13

In each group, athletes battled it out against each other. In each battle, athletes were assigned to the red or blue side by computerised random draw.

Each battle consisted of two rounds. In all battles, the athlete designated as "Blue" could decide whether to perform. first, or to allow their opponent "Red" to perform first.

During the round robin, scores became available at the end of each round. Athletes were ranked within each group by the number of rounds won and judges' votes collected and finally by pre-competition seeding.

At the end of the round robin, the best two athletes in each group progressed to the quarter-finals. The remaining athletes were ranked 9th to 16th, by the number of rounds won (excluding rounds won in the pre-qualifier), the number of votes collected (excluding votes collected in the pre-qualifier) and finally by pre-competition seeding.

Knock outs

Each knock-out battle consisted of three rounds. The athlete winning more rounds at the end of the battle was declared the winner.

The losing quarter-finalists were ranked 5th to 8th by the total number of rounds won (excluding rounds won in the pre-qualifier), total number of votes collected (excluding votes collected in the pre-qualifier), rounds won in the round robin, votes collected in the round robin and finally by pre-competition seeding.

The losing semi-finalists contested the bronze medal battle, and the winning semi-finalists contested the gold medal battle.

Olympic breaking scoring system

For all events, the competition consisted of battles between two athletes. Each battle consisted of a number of rounds. In each round one athlete performed first, then the other responded.

Each round was judged by nine judges against five criteria. The judging system produced a vote for each judge for each round in favour of one of the athletes (red or blue), with a percentage figure indicating the strength of their vote in favour of red or blue across all five criteria. The possible vote scores for each round were 9-0, 8-1, 7-2, 6-3 or 5-4 in favour of an athlete.