10 Parkour Vaults for Beginners: Master the Basics of Urban Movement

Ten vaults cover almost everything a beginner needs: the safety vault, lazy vault, speed vault, monkey vault, kong vault, dash vault, thief vault, turn vault, reverse vault, and side vault. Learn them in roughly that order. The first three are genuinely beginner-friendly. The middle ones demand more commitment, and the last few are as much about style and flow as efficiency.

A vault, strictly defined, is any movement that takes you over an obstacle while putting weight on it with your hands. That definition matters, because a few movements commonly lumped in with vaults are actually something else entirely, and we’ve kept those separate at the end.

1. Safety Vault (Step Vault)

One hand on the obstacle, one foot stepping onto it, the other leg swinging through. It’s the slowest vault and the most controlled, which is exactly why it’s the one to learn first. It works on most solid obstacles from thigh to hip height, and gives you a moment on top of the obstacle to reassess before committing to the far side.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Safety Vault

2. Lazy Vault

Approach at an angle, plant the hand nearest the obstacle, and swing your inside leg and then your outside leg over sideways. Your second hand takes over the support as the first comes off. The lazy vault suits obstacles you’re arriving at diagonally rather than head-on, and it’s forgiving enough to be a genuine second vault to learn.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Lazy Vault (and the Thief Vault Variation)

3. Speed Vault

Run straight at the obstacle, plant one hand, and swing both legs over sideways while keeping your body low. You come in straight and leave straight, which is what makes it fast. This is the vault most traceurs end up using more than any other in actual movement.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Speed Vault Correctly

4. Monkey Vault

Both hands plant on the obstacle, both knees tuck up, and your feet pass through between your arms. The defining detail: your hands make contact before your feet leave the ground. That’s what separates it from the kong, and it’s what makes the monkey the sensible one to learn first.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Kong Vault (and Monkey Vault) Safely

5. Kong Vault

The diving version of the monkey vault. Here your feet leave the ground before your hands touch, so you’re committing to the dive before you have a confirmed base. That single difference is what makes it both more powerful over long obstacles and considerably higher-risk. Master the monkey first, and practise over grass.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Kong Vault Safely

6. Dash Vault

Mechanically the reverse of a kong. Your feet go over first and your hands land behind you on the obstacle to push your body clear. Hand placement matters enormously here (flat palms, not fingertips), because the backward wrist angle is where people get hurt. Worth knowing that its practical value is genuinely debated within the community.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Dash Vault Correctly

7. Thief Vault

A close cousin of the lazy vault with the leg order flipped. You approach on an angle, your inside hand touches the obstacle, and your outside leg goes over first. Learn the lazy vault first, and the thief vault becomes a small change to the same pattern. It’s covered in the lazy vault guide.

8. Turn Vault

Vault over while rotating 180 degrees, so you land facing back the way you came, often dropping into a hang on the far side. It sounds like a stylistic choice and it isn’t: when the far side of an obstacle is a drop you can’t see the bottom of, turning to face it lets you lower yourself under control rather than committing blind.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Turn Vault Step by Step

9. Reverse Vault

You plant one hand and turn a full 360 degrees around it as you pass over, so your back faces the obstacle mid-vault and you land facing the way you started. It’s more expressive than efficient, and it demands real confidence because you briefly lose sight of your landing. Save it until the basics are automatic.

Full breakdown: How to Do a Reverse Vault

10. Side Vault

The simplest of the lot. Turn side-on, put both hands down, and swing your legs over together alongside your arms, parallel to the obstacle. It’s not fast and it doesn’t flow especially well, but it’s reliable and it works when you’re tired or unsure about the obstacle.

Not Vaults, But Learn Them Anyway

Three movements get grouped with vaults constantly and technically aren’t, because they don’t involve putting your weight on the obstacle with your hands. They’re still essential:

• The Tic Tac, pushing off a wall with one foot to redirect your momentum sideways
• The Wall Run, converting running speed into vertical height up a wall face
• The Precision Jump, a controlled standing jump landing exactly on a chosen point

Frequently Asked Questions

Which vault should I learn first?

The safety vault. It’s slow, controlled, and lets you pause on top of the obstacle, which makes it the lowest-consequence way to learn how your hands and body interact with a surface. Speed and lazy vaults follow naturally from it.

How high should the obstacle be when learning?

Around hip height is ideal for most vaults. Low enough that a failed attempt means stepping down rather than falling, high enough that the movement is genuinely a vault rather than a step over.

Do I need to learn all ten?

No. Most traceurs use three or four regularly, usually the speed, safety, kong, and lazy vaults. The rest expand your options for awkward obstacles and angles. Breadth is useful, but depth on a few reliable vaults matters more.

Continue Your Training

Once vaults feel solid, expand your repertoire: The Cat Leap, Palm Spins and Lache, and The Underbar all build on the foundation vaults give you.