Muay Thai, referred to as Thai Boxing in the United States, is a Martial Art developed in Thailand that blends art, science, and sport. Thai Boxing is great for both self-defense and physical fitness. Practitioners learn powerful kicks, elbows, and knees combined with western boxing. It's intense training methods and discipline makes it is very effective. Stand up grappling is also used and allowed in the ring.

The word muay derives from the Sanskrit mavya and Thai comes from the word Tai. Muay Thai is referred to as the "Art of Eight Limbs" or the "Science Of Eight Limbs" because it makes use of punches, kicks, elbows and knee strikes, thus using eight "points of contact", as opposed to "two points" (fists) in Western boxing and "four points" (hands and feet) used in sport-oriented martial arts. A practitioner of Muay Thai is known as a nak muay. Western practitioners are sometimes called nak muay farang meaning foreign boxer.

Muay Thai along with savate, karate, and taekwondo heavily influenced the development of kickboxing in Japan, Europe, and North America. Kickboxing in particular is considered by many practitioners to be a modified form of Muay Thai. But unlike Muay Thai, most kickboxing competitions do not allow elbows or prolonged clinching knee strikes to avoid potential fight-ending cuts. American kickboxing does not allow kicks below the waist.