Would you tolerate a sparring partner who isn't wearing 16 ounce gloves??

We all wear 12oz gloves and use control but that’s experienced and known people. I would be more concerned with people I didn’t know. You make a lot of sense regarding the difference in cushioning with glove brands.

People need to be picky AF when picking sparring partners and refuse to spar/stop sparring someone if they are not being a good partner, ESPECIALLY if you don't fight as a career. Your health, short-term and long-term isn't worth it.

Why KZfaq recently got full of damn stupid bots telling the creator how good are his/her videos? WTF is that about? By the way, I want to thank you for this exceptional content. Thank you!👌

For sparring sessions specifically as preparation for a fight, we typically recommend our students using the same size/type to be used in the fight so they can get used to that type of glove. For technical / casual sparring though, absolutely try to go as fair, safe and comfortable as possible in terms of weight, size and squishyness.

at the end of the day it comes down to how much force you are feeling from their strikes. Like Gabe implied, if you have enough control and cushion, even 10 oz is fine. I am so jealous of seeing Gabe's and others sparring content on youtube because it looks so fun with everyone watching out and making sure they aren't injuring each other. I am a bigger guy, and I pretty much have stopped sparring with people near my size at my gym. None of them know how to control their power, and ain't nobody got time to be worrying about head injuries when we are just pursuing a hobby.

When I see this kind of vídeos I always think how fortunate I am to be in a place where the coach and the colleagues are super respectful.

For a long time I sparred in 12 oz gloves but I'm a slim dude and one of the gym's coaches sometimes had me demo how to go light in sparring and drills. I've been using 16 oz gloves for a while now because I needed the extra cushioning sometimes and just to keep things consistent when that coach started saying we should use them. While we had a number of veterans at the gym with a lot of control, we also had some newer people who didn't have balance and coordination yet and sometimes fell into a strike or would get frustrated and become less controlled. Now we have A LOT of new people who started this year and another coach and I were discussing how we probably should send out a reminder on glove sizes again.

This one was pretty personal for me because this is how I started out in kickboxing. I started roughly the same time as another guy who had a good 4 inches height difference and 70lbs on me and he used these RDX 12oz gloves. Sparring with him I had one of my ribs cracked, my nose broken and one of my teeth slightly clipped. I find it highly disrespectful for people to wear a smaller glove than everyone else basically just to get that edge in sparring and boost their ego. With that said, I think sparring glove sizes for adults should range between 14 and 20oz from 135-140lb fighters to heavyweights.

I don't do hard sparring when I am not preparing for a fight so I don't really care and I use 12oz gloves myself, as I weigh around 63 kg and bigger gloves often just don't fit my wrist well. It's not really an issue if you and your partners have control. I also do MMA sparring in 8oz gloves, also never had any issues when training with good partners. I think that question might be overblown by people in clubs with really bad sparring etiquette - if everyone tries to take your head off everytime then yeah, it's probably good to wear bigger gloves, but at this point it might be better to change gyms and try to save your brain cells.

Top Ten Superfight 3000 are my go to. 16 Oz has a slim profile while being balanced and 2in foam over knuckles! Great gloves

I think body size is a determining factor. I would train with guys +220lbs wearing 16oz and then my buddy with 16oz gloves also but he weighs only 120lbs. I think more importantly is a person's ability to control themselves. I had some training partners that I didn't care what gloves they had on because they proved they could control their strikes. Other people I wouldn't want to spar with unless they were wearing pillows.

In boxing we differ glove size in sparring based on weight class, the big gloves and head gear stop cuts and bruises but concussions are part of the job

i hate how heavy 16 oz gloves are..... but that's why i think it might be helpful as a training/endurance tool on top of the added padding

How fucking hard is it for a coach to take a one second glimpse and feel of both partners gloves to make sure they're 16s and adequate padding? GUESS WHAT? NOT DONE!

Very good points made. Small guys and gals should be just fine with cushy smaller gloves. When you have guys who are throwing stiff shots at your face or nose they need to be called out or spoken too. Common sense has to take precedent.

Man, what timing for this video. Today in class we worked just boxing then did some sparring. One of the guys I went with wore what I perceived to be smaller than 16oz gloves. I was internally apprehensive, but since I decided to wear my headgear I felt confident enough about it. He tagged me and I was ok with it because he was not going hard to where I would be uncomfortable. Also, with my 16oz gloves I glued my hands to my head just in case.

I completely agree with you mate....to be honest it does annoy me sometimes in my gym....I'm 5ft and 53kg and they insist on me wearing heavy gloves (I wear 14s).....bearing in mind most of the time I'm sparring with guys 6ft plus with at least 30kg and a lot more experiencd 🤨

Good points made. We require 16s but not all are made equally. I haven’t really run into any that are too hard.

As a heavyweight I'm always going for the 16 ounce gloves during sparring, but I'm now considering going for smaller gloves since competition gloves are not 16. I want to get used to the smaller gloves in sparring so I get comfortable with them during competition.

I think that amateur style boxing gloves are the best for sparring, you can have a 12oz with more padding in the knuckle area than a regular style 16oz.

If someone is cool and just doesn’t have the right gear, there are always loaners there that they can use. For me it’s really more of a matter of decorum and respect. Whatever coach says to have on that day is what I feel like you should have on. If he wants you going in 16s or 6s he will tell you.

As long as we’re wearing the same size gloves , or properly accordingly to weight, and the gloves aren’t rock hard, I’m fine. 7-8oz hybrid MMA are awesome most the time

In my gym we all use 10oz gloves for sparring and regular training. Granted a lot of them are regularly training for fights but most just dont bother with the glove weights

Great points, Gab. Thanks!

I would be interested in hearing you (and your brother) give your thoughts on if/how glove weight influences long term trauma. I've heard that, for a variety of reasons, people who fight in sports that use smaller gloves or no gloves at all tend to live longer and healthier lives because they get hit with less mass AND their opponents cannot strike as hard without hurting their own hands. This may be changing with MMA for reasons I can't exactly point to (idk, maybe people punch harder now or whatever) but it does make sense to me that less mass and less force would lead to less trauma. Of course, the issue is that you are prone to suffering more superficial damage or even broken noses when you remove padding. So there's surely a balance to be had.

100% agree, my sparring glove are 14oz, but they are huge and very cushionned, more safe than most 16oz I've seen

For pure sparring literally doesn't matter, go for smaller (not necessarily lighter, just less height and width) so your shell has bigger gaps and your reach isn't as far, that'll teach good habits, and then depend on control, I have friends with whom I've sparred bare-knuckle, we did not break our hands nor face skin, I wouldn't trust anyone to do so, but with these friends specifically it was doable. For hard-sparring as you said, what matters is if the glove is tough or soft. Lastly if one of the sparring partner is in fight camp, then the glove has to be the same weight as the one they'll fight in. If possible sure they can try and have softer gloves in the same weight but I wouldn't put such a financial burden on someone...

If you're prepping for a fight, you should training the size gloves you'll fight in.

From the first time I trained, at 13y/o I have used 16oz for training, bag work, and sparring. I don't know why people complain about them, you don't need every advantage you can get when it comes to sparring, if you can't tone it down then you either don't spar or you spar with experienced people who can handle it.

💯 so nice to hear someone else saying this!

Im 5'8 150 lbs and even 14oz start to get heavy pretty quick. I prefer 12oz and to just use control. Just started a new muay thai class and coach told everyone to get 16oz gloves, Im like dang haha. Gonna have some buff shoulders 😂

When in doubt use 16 oz. But padding stiffness is important as well. If you're doing hard sparring that's different and then it should be agreed upon on both parties sparring.

True, there can a big difference. My 18' are bigger than my gyms 16' gloves but those are more soft at the front of the glove. Even boxing competetive 10' are softer and more cushy on the front than mine 18 gloves.

in our gym we always spar with 10s... except me who wears 16s all day long

I never saw anyone adult wearing under 14 OZ. Smaller teenagers I saw wearing 12 oz. 14-16 OZ is standard at our gyms here in Germany Edit: I wear 16 OZ Phantom gloves. I'm 1,83 and 81 kg

Really depends on who it is that I am sparring

It probably just depends upon the gym, but 16oz bag gloves were "required" for sparring at Fairtex SF, most likely because it was an easy to follow, generic rule. Obviously the trainers weren't going to do a glove examination to see who was wearing 10oz gloves, or doing a squish test to see how hard the foam or coverings were, but it was understood 16oz were for sparring. But asking to check a partner's gloves before sparring is probably good habit, particularly if you're a pro/am fighter who doesn't need unnecessary injury.

As far my knowledge goes. Gloves are not there to protect someone getting hit. It is more the opposite. Gloves are there to protect the hands of the attacker. The higher the oz the harder someone can punch. This is even seen historical as boxing back in the days was bare-knuckle. People usually would attack the head less often and throwing more body shoots, as otherwise, when you don't condition your hands in a karate style, your hands usually break by hitting people in the head. Even if people don't believe it, but bare-knuckle fighting is a lot better for the head as wearing massive gloves. Tony Jeffries has a video about this topic. So makes no sense to me that people complaining that people with massive force should wear even bigger gloves. It will just hit a lot harder. You just can consider the gloves as extra weight attached to your hands to do even more damage to the head of an opponent. But anyway someone should be able to control his force in sparring independt of the the oz of his gloves. Otherwise he should wear maybe the softest gloves that are possible, not the one who are extra hard.

Pros can spar with 4-8 oz gloves without hurting each other

TBH, I pay more attention to who I'm sparring with and maintaining the right vibe than opponent glove weight. Sometimes it's nice to keep light and technical, and heavy gloves can mess with the vibe.

I wear 18 down to 12 depending. But for most spars I’m in my 18s so I don’t develop bad habits. I can punch fast without hurting my opponents which gives me the ability to fight at a fast pace for someone weighing 212lbs and very lean. I trained for awhile in my 14s, but I have to pull my punches so much especially vs smaller partners. So bigger softer gloves really made a difference. You get used to the eventually, and when I drop to my 14s it’s night and day, and if I drop to my 12s I feel like I have nothing on.

I read somewhere that the gloves are made to protect your hands first and the face of your partner second. That the Oz doesn't change much the impact on the receiving end. Dunno if it's true.

I couldn't agree more!

im still on the fence of what to get for Muay Thai. I currently use 12oz for pad work but looking to get a pair of sparing gloves but dont know if i should get 14 or 16. I'm 5'8 currently weigh 200 but thats because im overweight and why i started Muay Thai in the first place id say my healthy weight is between 165-170lbs. Specifically looking at Yokkao to which i hear are more cushy. Also dont want gloves that feel like my hands are lose in.

makes sense since synthetic gloves tend to be squisher and softer than leather gloves

Thanks for the video. My current gloves are 16s, but they're getting close to the end of their lifespan and I'm considering something smaller when I replace them. I'm mostly a kicker, so I feel like I can get away with smaller and easier-to-travel gloves.

I think everybody should wear 16 oz gloves, because there's so many people in gyms that can't control their shots, can't control their power and have massive egos.

i think it’s fine if it’s controlled and you have headgear.

I even recommend to put the gloves on a scale because most gloves do not weigh the advertised weight.

As long as they're going light, I don't care how much your gloves weigh

I’m 6ft 185lbs and I’ve started wearing 16oz gloves only.

I have sparred with people wearing 6s and even 4s to my 14s and as long as they're patty caking to the head or clinching it's fine. As long as I'm not getting rocked or seriously hurt I don't really have a big problem with it.

Hayabusa 16oz Gloves is next level bullshit, they seriously feel like Twins 12oz

16 Oz gloves with no hand wraps for us heavyweights. I wonder how much better off my sparring partners would have been if I hadn't worn hand wraps back then

I prefer to go on 8 ounces touch/light sparring with control than 16 ounces. When people wear 16 ounces they easily heat up to get satisfied with their hand speed.

"Quantity vs. quality" all over again.

I use 12 since its the size you use in a fight... Doesnt mean you have to beat the crap out of everybody

I always spar with my 10oz gloves, I‘m 60kg and everyone in my Gym is has Like 10-15kg on me. Nonetheless I always just touch them with my punches to the face because I‘m still wearing 10oz. It‘s just that the stores around here only sell these kinds of gloves so I didn‘t really have a choice at the start. Since all of us wear 10-12oz I don‘t Feels as Bad though.

It is on the coach to make sure anyone over 130lbs is wearing 16 ounce gloves.

I weight around 250lbs and use 16 oz gloves but many or even most(what ive used anyway) of them end up being so god damn big thats impossible to clinch with them and also they give fake sense of safety by being these pillow fortresses, you cant block the same way with smaller gloves or without gloves as with them. Think i just have to find another pair of smaller gloves, suggestions would be awesome if anyone has!

Gloves size should be reflective of your weight. I can't in good conscience spar with people at 270 without big, well padded 16oz gloves. When i get tired i can lose control of some of my punches and I already gave some people a black eye. Not because im better, just because im bigger. And since im not a pro and some guys at my gym are, i feel like safety for others is more important than my ego.

Im not even sure i could move my hands properly if i was using 16 oz gloves

how about sparring with no gloves? Not everyone can do it, but there are a lot of combinations that change when you can use 16 oz gloves as shields, versus having to use more dexterity for trapping, control and choosing better targets. Open hands or loose fist chilled sparring is good for me. The other thing could be "predator armor" (which is much better than helmets)... it's a shame they don't make that any more

Depends on size of the person imo, if you are 240lbs u should wear 16oz but i believe you shouldn’t be wearing anything less than 14oz tbh

Yes 16oz is a must have

Honestly I have two pairs of the same gloves on ein 12oz, the other 16oz. There is no difference in padding, just the size of the glove differs.

Bought my first pair of gloves like 3 days ago, 12oz work for me, I'm a teen and the gloves are squishy though. Pretty good so far but i want to get 14oz

I weight 145 and I am the only fool in my gym that spars with 16 oz. Hell, the larger 190+ pounds guys use 12 oz. My gloves are really oversized for my hands and have really nice foam, so I wondered why tf do the other guys gloves hurt so much when they touch me. Guess what, they all use 12 or 14 oz gloves that are cheap and barely have padding. Only fair thing for me was getting a pair of 12 oz too. So now we will see how next session goes.

its not about gloves but about partner and comunication ;)

Even the writen weight isnt always true, for example I have 16oz Tweens but in reality they weight 13oz, then I wanted 10oz for heavy bag, I just wanted to feel how fast can I be with profi match weight gloves for my weight, so I bought 10oz Yakima gloves and those were 13oz, so you cannot rely on those numbers, each brand has it different, 10 and 16 oz gloves both weight 13 oz, now I finaly found 10 oz but officialy those are 8 oz 😂 I like them on heavy bag 👌🏼

i spar in 6-8 oz i think. the hybrid hayabusa gloves, but i dont punch (or kick) hard to the head, at least not intentionally. we do mma, so i need them to grapple

Cushioning is where it's at.

I'd rather get hit with a 12oz cushy glove than a 16oz dense/puncher's glove

The gloves protect my hands they don't protect your brain

Im 5’6 145 and I wear 14oz gloves, one of my sparring partners is 160 and wears 12s, I really dont mind because he has control

You should be able to use 10 oz glove sparring is not full power it should be controlled

Do you have a recommendation on the number of gloves a person should have and for what discipline? There's so many choices out there!

Agreed 💯%

I use 16oz because of my size and weight. I thought weight class and glove size went hand in hand

Are 12oz gloves better for bag work and pad work?

32oz ring to cage's, cause I'm a unit.

I've got a pair of 20oz gloves,and i will never use em in sparring,cause they are as hard as a concrete))

14s16s provide better protection as well

Just as big an issue is people who use their 16oz gloves on the heavy bag and pads all week then want to spar in the same gloves. Sparring gloves should be reserved for sparring in my opinion

I have a theory of training that a school should train in boxing gloves, mma gloves and barehanded. Include in that training in the heaviest boots you own (steel toed or snowboarding boots), tennis shoes or running shoes and barefoot. The differences in movement of the hands with bulky gloves vs barehand are vast and you can get really tripped up when you are unfamiliar, getting stuck or gassed easily. Same with steel toes; you're gonna be more powerful but you'll tear your knee apart without specific forms. It also tires you out and restricts your ankle mobility. Not only will you learn the strengths and limitations of each loadout you will also make better decisions in footwear for every day use. Finally it will also prepare the student to engage in any contest with reasonable confidence. If someone wants to box or kickboxing you can throw down with big bulky gloves, mma and grappling/takedown while wearing gi, street clothes and bare chested. Alternatively Joe Badguy at the bar can catch hands that don't break and you can transition seamlessly to toe kicking around blocks with hardened shoes. As we know you hit completely different with the hand depending on how protected they are and the feet are no different. You could key muscle memory of style to the equipment, instantly breaking out the right style depending on the gear worn. So many boxers go bareknuckle and punch too hard or can't make a fist because they ONLY train with gloves. Wing Chun masters with any gloves, particularly boxing but even mma have trained the margins of range of motion so intensely and narrow margins that the extra bulk or weight can unbalance or even snag. Let me know your thoughts! As always fascinating and informative video. I'd love to see you do Sil Nim Tao with 16 oz gloves and sticky hands with MMA gloves to test how the forms vary and practicality is affected. Not everything I said applies to sparring specifically but I think you can learn the strengths and weaknesses of your chosen "lane" by training with other styles, applications and gear.

I get my 2 years old daughter to wear 14oz gloves before punching the cat, safety first.

I use 8 oz for everything

Lol - I am sparring with 18 Oz and I am 1m65 tall lol

Only 16oz training kickboxing as a hobby sparring and bag work I'm 75kg should I use smaller gloves

Back in the day, I trained bare knuckle. Small gloves were just coming into use. From a real fighting perspective, how does glove size make a difference?

115lb female and I've never worn 16,oz gloves. 14oz already looks a bit ridiculous and big. 16 would be way too big

How about when you hitting the heavy bag What glove size would you recommend or is recommended?

From what i know 16 or more is usually recommended for big guys

I thought the the more the glove give the more knuckle you’d feel

Nah. Just go brass knuckle sparring😅

@gabrielvargaorfficial which gloves are more comfortable to wear ? I have 10oz pad gloves but they have way too much padding and heavier than 10 oz.

I never knew people cared about glove size so much. Granted I’m a kyukoshin guy so wearing gloves feels kind of foreign to me.

I don’t mind people using 14s

I want them to use 16s and I won't spar guys who go crazy and dont have control.