Slacklining Tricks From Beginner to Advanced

If you’re already slacklining and are ready to take the next steps (literally), you might consider learning a trick or two.

Given the nature of slacklining, explaining tricks in text format may not be much help except for some basic moves that we will discuss in sentence form below.

But below that, you’ll see a series of videos with various levels of tricks from several sources to give you an idea of what is possible.

Let’s get started!

Basic slacklining tricks

Not all of these are tricks per se but they are tricky and require skill:

Sitting down: Sitting down on the slackline involves slowly crouching down and sitting on your butt with legs crosses like you used to do to a school assembly when you were a kid. Then slowly stand back up without losing your balance and falling off the line.

Climbing on the slackline using your non-dominant foot: Normally you climb on the slackline with your dominant foot. Using your non-dominant foot (once you’ve mastered it with your dominant one) can present a challenge to most people.

Turning around: This involves turning around 180° to face the opposite direction that you are currently facing. You might consider doing this when you have walked all the way to the opposite end of the slackline, do a 180° turn and walk back the same way you came.

Walking backwards: Instead of doing a 180° as above, try walking backwards with one foot behind the other. This involves moving your front leg behind the back one slowly and repeating the process.

Jumping: Jumping up and down on the line is just like it sounds. You can start by bouncing and keeping your balance before graduating to actually jumping so that your feet are completely off the slackline before landing on it again.

Let’s now take a visual look at some of the more advanced slackline tricks that are better explained with a video.

Buttbounce

A buttbounce will take a bit of time for the average person to master given that the way your feet land on the slackline is key in order that you can quickly regain your balance as you stand up.

Safetyflip

This is certainly more advanced than a buttbounce…

Combo trick

Why do one trick when you can do two or three in quick succession?

Linesnap

The linesnap is considered a basic trick but might take some practice as the video below shows. It involves bouncing slightly on the line and when quickly jumping up to snap the line and then quickly regaining your footing and balance without falling.

Beginner slackline tricks compilation

Here is a short compilation video with a number of beginner slackline tricks.

Slackline training ideas

In this video below, Jonas demonstrates a number of activities you can do on the slackline to make yourself familiar with the line and get comfortable with it. He also demonstrates a few ways to stand on the line and turn as well as sitting on the slackline while keeping your balance.

Pay close attention to how he uses his arms and his body in general to quickly regain his balance when needed.

15 slackline tricks from beginner to expert

If you’re looking for more of a challenge, check out this video which shows a series of tricks of varying skill level from beginner to expert.

Summary

If you’re looking at just keeping your slacklining to basic walking on the line, that’s fine. But learning a few tricks here and there can help to keep it interesting while also keeping you motivated in case simply walking on the line gets boring after awhile.

Plus, some of the “tricks” such as bouncing, changing direction, walking backwards, etc can help you get a better feel on the slackline while increasing the chance you are able to maintain your balance when walking.