The Best BJJ Apps in 2026, Sorted by What They Actually Do
BJJ apps fall into four groups that get blurred together in every roundup: training journals, instructional libraries, strength and mobility programmes, and decision trainers. Picking well means knowing which problem you have.
Full disclosure before anything else: we build one of the apps in this article. That is a good reason to read it sceptically, and it is also why the piece is organised by category rather than as a ranked list with our own product at number one, which is what most roundups on this topic are.
App Store figures below were last checked on 6 October 2026 in the US store. Ratings move; the categories do not.
The four categories
Almost every BJJ app is one of these, plus a small group of mat-side utilities such as round timers. Comparing across categories is meaningless.
| Category | What it solves | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Training journal | You forget what you trained and cannot see patterns | BJJBuddy, BJJ Notes, FlowRoll, Marune, BJJ OS |
| Instructional library | You want technique content to study | BJJ Fanatics, BJJ Master App by Grapplearts, BJJFlowCharts, BJJ Roadmap, iGrapple |
| Strength and mobility | Your body is the limiting factor | JuggernautBJJ, Yoga for BJJ, BulletProof for BJJ |
| Decision training | You know techniques and freeze under pressure | TapTheory, Underhook |
Training journals
The largest and most crowded category, and the one where the apps are most similar to each other.
BJJBuddy (Ranknoodle LLC) is the veteran, with 462 ratings and a 4.4 average. It leans on submission and tap tracking with charts, aiming to show you where your game has holes over time.
BJJ Notes (Felipe Ribas Forbeck), 177 ratings at 4.8, is a straightforward log: rolls, drills, submissions, sweeps, takedowns, class notes, gi or no-gi, plus streaks.
FlowRoll (David Anthony Kiely), 635 ratings at 4.9 and the fastest-growing app in this piece, adds a personal technique library on top of the journal, so your notes accumulate into a categorised database rather than a chronological feed.
Marune, 96 ratings at 4.6, logs sessions, techniques, supplementary workouts, belt promotions and competition history, and builds a personal technique library alongside them.
BJJ OS, launched in January 2026 with 18 ratings at 5.0, pairs session logging with an AI coach built on a library of analysed technique videos. It is too new to judge how well the coaching holds up over months.
Who they are for: anyone who trains regularly and cannot remember what they worked on last month. The honest caveat is that journals are only as good as the habit, and most people abandon them, which is why a two-list system beats a full transcript.
Instructional libraries
BJJ Fanatics (Fanatic LLC) is the giant of the category by a wide margin: 4,522 ratings at 4.9. It is the app front end to a very large instructional catalogue, and it is a shop as much as a study tool.
BJJ Master App by Grapplearts (Grapplearts Enterprises), 73 ratings at 4.7, is the app version of Stephan Kesting's long-running instructional work.
BJJFlowCharts (MaxiGarami OU), 81 ratings at 4.6, is worth separating from the rest: it organises technique as connected flowcharts rather than as isolated videos, with a free fundamentals course.
BJJ Roadmap, on the store since 2014 (62 ratings at 3.9), maps positions and the transitions between them, which helps beginners see the whole game rather than a pile of moves. iGrapple (3 ratings) is a no-gi library of more than a thousand techniques organised by position.
Who they are for: people who want more material. The limitation of the whole category is the one every practitioner eventually meets, which is that watching builds recognition rather than retrieval. Material solves a knowledge gap and does very little for a decision gap.
Strength and mobility
JuggernautBJJ (Juggernaut Apps, 500 ratings at 4.9) delivers strength and conditioning programming built for grapplers. Yoga for BJJ (Joy Yoga AS, 102 ratings) and BulletProof for BJJ (34 ratings) sit in the mobility and injury-resilience space.
Who they are for: anyone whose limiting factor is their body rather than their jiu-jitsu, which after thirty-five is a large share of practitioners. Given that knees and shoulders lead the injury data, this category is undersold rather than oversold.
Decision training
The newest and smallest category, and the one we work in, so read what follows with that in mind.
TapTheory (Jacob Oldham), 66 ratings at 4.7, describes itself as a BJJ IQ app: simulated sparring scenarios with decision paths, plus quizzes and challenges, aimed at improving decision-making between classes.
Underhook is ours. It presents real positions as short decision questions, two or three genuine options and a consequence, and brings positions back around before you forget them. It launched on 22 July 2026 and has six ratings at the time of this update, which is the honest state of a new app rather than a selling point. It is not related to BJJ Journal: UnderHooked, a separate journal app with a similar name.
Who this category is for: practitioners who know techniques and still freeze in the position, which is a different problem from not knowing enough. If your rounds go wrong because you were a beat late rather than because you lacked a move, this is the category that addresses it. If you cannot yet name three positions that beat you, a journal is the better first purchase, because the problem list is the input to everything else.
How to actually choose
Ask what went wrong in your last five rolls.
- "I cannot remember what I have been working on." Journal.
- "I do not know enough techniques from this position." Instructional library, ideally one organised by position rather than by video.
- "My body gives out or keeps getting tweaked." Strength and mobility.
- "I know what to do and I do it too late." Decision training.
- "I do not train often enough." No app fixes that. Fix the schedule first.
For the mat itself, a round timer such as Jiu-Jitsu Timer (109 ratings at 4.9) covers open mats and home drilling; it is a utility rather than a training method.
One app per problem, and only while it is your problem. The most common failure with training apps is owning four of them and using none.
What no app can do
None of this is training. Grappling is a contact skill, and the only place it develops is on the mat with a resisting partner. Every app in every category above is either a record of training, a supplement to it, or a way of preparing the decisions you will use in it.
The reasonable expectation is that a good app makes your two or three weekly sessions land better. Anything promising more than that is selling.
BJJ app questions
What is the best BJJ app?
There is no single answer, because the apps solve different problems. Journals help you see patterns, instructional libraries add material, strength apps address the body, and decision trainers work on choosing under pressure. Identify which of those is currently costing you rounds.
Are BJJ apps worth it?
They are worth it when matched to a real gap and used consistently, in the same way a training journal is worth it only if you write in it. They are not worth it as a substitute for mat time, and no app makes a difference if you train once a month.
Do any BJJ apps actually teach technique?
Instructional libraries deliver technique content, and the good ones organise it by position rather than as a video catalogue. What no app can do is give you the feedback of a resisting partner, which is where technique becomes usable.
Can an app help me if I only train once a week?
Yes, and its role changes: with a long gap between sessions, the highest-value thing is retention and rehearsal, so a journal plus something that brings positions back before you forget them does more than more instructional content.
What is the difference between a BJJ journal and a decision-training app?
A journal records what happened so you can see patterns over time. A decision-training app makes you produce answers to positions under a small amount of pressure, which is retrieval practice rather than record-keeping. They pair well and they are not substitutes.
