In the 1800's there where different styles of jiu-jitsu. The techniques where different between styles but generally all the styles had unarmed techniques (strikes, throws, keylocks, chokes, etc.) and once in a while weaponstraining. A young but vigorous master of different jiu-jitsu styles, Jigoro Kano, founded his own style and created the martial art Judo (also known as Kano-ryu jiu-jitsu) in the 1880's. One of Kano's insights was to apply fullforcetraining against competent opponents, instead of only relying on partnertraining.

One of Kano's students was Mitsuo Maeda, who was also known as "Count Koma". He got a position in the goverment assigned by prins Hirohito to watch over the Japanese emigration to Brazil. Maeda emigrated to Brazil in 1914. He was helped by the Brazilian politicus Gastão Gracie, whos father George Gracie emigrated to Brazil from Scotland. Out of grattitude for the help he got, Maeda teached jiu-jitsu to Gastão's son Carlos Gracie.Carlos in his turn teached his brothers Osvaldo, Gastão Jr., Jorge and Helio.

In 1925 Carlos and his brothers opened their first jiu-jitsu school. Carlos and his brothers, especially Helio, changed the original form of Japanese jiu-jitsu by adapting the techniques so that they worked more on the principle of leverage instead of power and explosiveness. They experimented with simple techniques, adjusted and perfected them so that they would work effectively, regardless of shape and physique. Because of this they went away from traditional Japanese jiu-jitsu and started the developement of a more efficient and complete martial art.

They started to concentrate more on submission groundfighting, especially the guard position. This allowed for a weaker person to defend himself against a stronger opponent, and eventually win.

In the 1970's Rolls Gracie was the champion of Brazil. He had taken the techniques of jiu-jitsu to a new level. At this time the openguard techniques and variations (spiderguard, butterflyguard, etc.) became a part of bjj.

In the 1990's Rorion Gracie moved from Brazil to Los Angeles. He wanted to show the world how good Gracie jiu-jitsu is. In Brazil, no rules Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) competitions (Also known as Vale Tudo) has been popular since the beginning of the 1900's.

Rorion and Art Davie heard about the Ultimate Fighting Championship. This was an american tv-show that began in 1993. They put experts of different martial arts against eachother in an environment with allmost no rules and no weightclasses, to see wich martial arts would really work. Rorion entered his brother Royce Gracie, an expert in brazilian jiu-jitsu. Royce dominated the first years of the UFC and had 11 victories and no losses. On one event he defeated four different fighters on one night. This while he was only 77kg and was allot smaller and skinnier than his opponents.

The strategy used in groundfighting and techniques of bjj are among the top of the world now. Allmost every succesfull MMA fighter spends part of his training on bjj.