Boxing Gloves Vs MMA Gloves

With the emergence of UFC, the rivalry between Boxing & Mixed Martial Arts has come to light now more than ever. While both are fighting sports, they have different rules & regulations, not to mention having a contrast with the gloves.

You may think the gloves don’t matter, the real matter lies within your skill. But if you are new to these combat sports, then you should know the difference between them as the gloves vary in impact & protection. Let’s take a look at the major difference between them.

Boxing Gloves Vs MMA Gloves

1. Fingers

The first major difference is that the boxing gloves encompass your entire hand. On the other hand, MMA gloves keep the final knuckles & fingertips exposed.

It’s logical because in MMA you need to keep your hands as dexterous as possible for any grappling or wrestling. Whereas in boxing you are using only your fist, so keeping the whole hand intact is important for hand safety.

2. Padding

Apart from the finger area exposed, there is another aspect you might find seeing both types of gloves. You would certainly notice the difference in the amount of padding both gloves have. This also contributes to the weight of the gloves.

As you will be landing hundreds of punches in a boxing match, you need more padding for optimum protection of your hands. But for MMA, it doesn’t restrict to only using hands but also kicks & grappling. So that’s why MMA gloves have light padding.

3. Impact

You may think there would be a contrast in impact for the gloves due to the padding difference. But from extensive research, it has been found that both the gloves land almost the same impact. But the impact damage may vary.

There was a test done on Former UFC Champion Bas Rutten. He delivered punches to a specialized heavy bag wearing both boxing & MMA gloves. The result was almost even as the MMA glove landed 295 kilos of force & the boxing glove landed 291 kilos of force.

Both the results are almost equal, but the MMA glove can result in greater sudden impact damage. The boxing glove damage, on the other hand, can accumulate over time. Damage on both gloves can result in an instant knockout.

4. Hand Closure

You would see that there is a variety of gloves to the enclosure of the hands. Boxing gloves have a certain culture to wrap around half of the boxer’s forearms. Whereas MMA gloves barely cover the top of the wrist. This is so that mixed martial arts fighters

5. Strapping

Due to the heavy enclosure of boxing gloves, it has laces to tie the glove in place to your hand. It is much similar to the lacing of your shoes. On the other hand, MMA gloves are held by only a wrapping strip or velcro tabs.

MMA fighters need to have more freedom with their hands. So it won’t suit them to have a heavy strap around their wrist or forearms. But boxers need their gloves well accustomed to their forearms so that the gloves don’t come off even when defending yourself.

6. Hand Wraps

In boxing, wearing hand wraps under the gloves is a more common practice. To protect you from hundreds of impacts from those heavy fists can be difficult. But MMA fighters don’t have the need for hand wraps as the gloves have very little room for it.

But to protect your knuckles, wrists & forearms, you need to wear a hand wrap under that glove if you want your hand to survive those lethal blows every round.

Conclusion

Despite all these experiments & discussion of different aspects showing that comparing these two types of gloves can give inconclusive results, you can’t calm the fan’s enthusiasm. If you find boxing fans & MMS fans setting the debate over a fight, it won’t really surprise anyone considering both the sport has a huge fan base.

You can’t really say this one is better because boxing & MMA are different sports. Boxing is solely a fight of the fist. That’s why Floyd Mayweather had the upper hand in his fight with Conor Mcgregor. Maybe more matches between boxers & MMA fighters can give us some light, who knows!