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Does Muay Thai Have a National Chain? (2026)

Ask that about coffee, or gyms, or even yoga, and you get an obvious answer. Ask it about muay thai and the answer is: essentially no. This is one of the most fragmented fitness categories in America — a nation of independent camps. Here's the data on how fragmented, and the far more useful question it points to: what else do these gyms teach? Updated 2026-07-18.

The fragmentation, in one number

Of the 3,149 muay thai gyms in the directory, 3,111 — 98.8% — are independent, unaffiliated with any multi-location brand. The handful that do belong to a chain aren't muay thai chains at all; they're kickboxing and MMA franchises that happen to run muay thai classes.

#Multi-location brandLocations in directory
1 Tiger Schulmann's 34
2 CKO Kickboxing 3
3 iLoveKickboxing 1

For comparison, boutique fitness categories are often 20–40% chain-owned. Muay thai's 1.2% is a rounding error — which means when you pick a gym, you're picking a specific coach and room, not a brand standard. That's the whole game in muay thai: how to choose a gym matters more here than almost anywhere in fitness.

The better question: what else do they teach?

Muay thai gyms are rarely single-art. 94.5% of them also train at least one other martial art, an average of 3.7 other disciplines each — most American "muay thai gyms" are really striking-and-grappling houses. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is the most common companion art, on the schedule at 75.5% of gyms.

DisciplineMuay thai gyms that also teach itShare of all gyms
Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) 2,379
75.5%
Kickboxing 2,258
71.7%
MMA 1,994
63.3%
Boxing 1,900
60.3%
Wrestling 1,054
33.5%
Karate 744
23.6%
Judo 630
20%
Krav Maga 120
3.8%

Browse any of these as its own layer — every gym that pairs muay thai with, say, BJJ or boxing — from the disciplines directory. Weighing arts against each other? Start with muay thai vs kickboxing vs MMA.

How many arts under one roof?

Counting muay thai plus every other art a gym trains, the typical gym is a small academy, not a one-style studio. The most common profile is a gym teaching muay thai plus 4 other arts. Only 174 gyms show muay thai on its own so far — and some of those simply haven't had their full schedule surface in our crawl yet.

Other arts taught (besides muay thai)Gyms
Muay thai only (so far) 174
+ 1 other art 267
+ 2 other arts 460
+ 3 other arts 560
+ 4 other arts 714
+ 5 other arts 582
+ 6 other arts 301
+ 7 other arts 88
+ 8 other arts 3

These are evidence floors — a gym counts an art only once its website or a reviewer names it — so single-art counts shrink as the crawl fills in.

Cite this data

Suggested attribution: “What US Muay Thai Gyms Also Teach” — MuayThaiClasses.net, 2026, linked to https://www.muaythaiclasses.net/muay-thai-stats/chains/. The tables are CC BY 4.0: chart them, quote them, publish them — just link back. Want a custom cut (by state, metro, or discipline)? Email us.

Download the full CSV Data updated 2026-07-18

Methodology: chain assignment comes from gym names and brand sites; a gym is "independent" unless it clearly belongs to a known multi-location brand. The disciplines mix is mined from each gym's website and its customer reviews — a discipline counts only when named in the gym's own copy or a reviewer's words, never guessed from the business category — so all shares are floors that grow with each re-crawl of our 3,149-gym directory. Share = gyms teaching that art ÷ all directory gyms. We are not affiliated with any gym or brand. More data: the stats hub and America's muay thai capitals.