45 Beginner Skateboard Tricks You Can Learn In A Day

With literally hundreds of skateboard tricks out there, it’s a bit overwhelming to figure out which tricks to try first. So in this guide, I break down 45 tricks that I found easiest to learn early on, and will offer you some quick wins to feel like your progression is skyrocketing!

Now before we start, you need to be comfortable standing and pushing on your skateboard. If you aren’t familiar with that yet, spend a bit more time riding your board, then come back to this post. If you’re all good on the “riding your board” front, then prepare to get stoked with some tricks you can land today.

With so many tricks to look at, I’ve broken these tricks down into 3 main sections:

• Beginner Flat Ground Tricks
• Beginner Transition Tricks
• More Challenging Beginner Skateboard Tricks

Beginner Skateboard Tricks On Flat Ground

The following beginner tricks can be done just about anywhere, but will be easiest on a smooth flat surface!

1. Manual

Manuals are one of the best beginner skateboarding tricks since there are so many variations of them. However, to start, try to just manual small distances between two points on flat ground. A great starting point is between two cracks in the sidewalk or between two features at the skatepark.

This is a fun trick to challenge your balance anytime you’re riding your board. Then as you progress, you can try to manual out of tricks or onto different features!

2. Hippie Jump

A Hippie Jump is when you jump and lift both feet up off your board while the board stays on the ground. This can be done with or without features to jump over, but to start, just try jumping on your board and landing back on it. Once you get more confident with this trick, try to hippie jump over objects like a small flat bar at the skatepark.

3. Flip On/Foot Stomp

The Flip On was one of the first tricks I ever learned on a skateboard and it definitely feels awesome to add to your bag of tricks. This is a stationary trick since the board starts upside down with the grip tape to the ground. From there, just place your feet underneath the board so when you jump, it flips the board upright and you can land back on it.

This trick also serves as a fun way to get back on your board after a failed flip trick attempt too!

4. Running Start

Running starts are a super easy trick that looks stylish and are helpful for future tricks when you have a small amount of run-up. This trick basically takes the action of getting onto your board and makes it one fluid movement. By holding onto the nose of your board them letting go and stepping onto it at the same time, you’ll keep your momentum going as you transition from running to rolling.

5. Caveman

A Caveman is essentially a trick involving jumping onto your skateboard either on flat ground or from a drop. It’s easiest to learn these on flat ground first, then try them off a small drop as you feel comfortable with it.

To make this trick easier, make sure to hold the nose of your skateboard and have your feet in your normal stance when you’re in mid-air. That way once you land back on the board, you are already in the correct riding position.

6. Vanilla Milkshake

The Vanilla Milkshake is another stationary beginner skateboard trick that looks a lot harder than it is. With your board on its side, place the outside of your front foot (right foot for goofy, left foot for regular stance) against the rear bolts. Then in one sweeping movement, scoop your foot in a circular motion up and down to rotate and flip the board.

It’s easiest to practice this scooping motion without jumping a few times until you get it nailed down. Once you can rotate and flip the board, jump halfway through the movement to pick up your back foot and land both feet on the deck.

7. Body Varial

A body varial can be done on either flat ground or while doing other tricks like ollies for example. However, to start off, try this trick on flat ground without moving. The movement is quite simple as you are just jumping and turning 180° to land back on your board.

To make this trick a bit easier, imagine yourself like a Lego man where your shoulders hips, and knees all move together. This will help ensure your feet stay in the correct position and you don’t lose balance once you land.

8. Rail Stand

A Rail Stand is a trick that turns your board half way to leave it on its side. In the same motion you rotate the board onto its side, you lift your feet to land over the wheels. Once you’re balanced on the board in the primo position, jump and push your feet forward slightly to rotate the board back to normal to place your feet back on the grip tape.

9. Nose Stall / Nosebleed

Some people like to call it a nose stall, others call it a nosebleed, but either way it’s a stall on a small ledge, curb, or stair. With a wider stance, roll up to your chosen curb or stair with enough speed that your front trucks will run into it. As your front trucks bump into the curb or stair, shift your weight forward onto the nose to stall and lift up your rear wheels. To exit the stall, just shift your weight back onto the rear wheels and slowly roll away!

Before doing this, make sure to find a ledge that’s close to the same height as the nose of your skateboard to make the process easier!

10. Boneless

Although this one looks a bit complicated, it’s a surprisingly easy trick to learn once you’re comfortable riding around. The most important part of this trick is to grab onto the toe edge of your skateboard before you take your front foot off. This is a common mistake I see beginners make that makes this trick a whole lot harder.

Instead, try to think of it as a step by step process. First grabbing the board, then sliding off your front foot, jumping and lifting your board, then finally letting go of the grab and landing back on it.

11. Biebelheimer

This one’s a bit of a goofy trick but it’s super fun to try. It’s essentially like a running start except with your board dropping to the ground with the grip tape side down. With a good enough drop, the board will naturally bounce and flip back onto its wheels in the same motion you jump and land back on it. Sometimes it takes a few tries to get the drop right, but once you do, this is a great beginner skate trick to show off to friends.

12. Nose Manual

Nose manuals are a bit tricker and more intimidating than a regular manual on your rear wheels. However, they are still another easy beginner trick you can learn in just a few minutes. Although it will end up taking you much longer than that to get really good at them.

Like with a regular manual, a great place to practice these is on flat ground between two points. I like to challenge myself by rolling between cracks on the road when I’m skating around. Just make sure to keep your eyes up and look where you want to go. It helps a lot when learning nose manuals!

13. Kick Turns

Kick turns are an essential part of learning to turn on a skateboard but they are also considered a trick on their own. You can start by doing small kick turns, then progressing into larger kick turns where you rotate a full 180° or more.

14. Tic-Tacs

Tic Tacs are a trick that creates forward momentum by quickly kick turning forward and back. With each turn, your rear wheels cover a bit of ground naturally as the board pivots. By linking multiple forward and back kick turns together, you end up picking up a surprising amount of speed without ever needing to push.

This is a handy trick to know as you progress since you can pick up speed to a feature without taking your foot off your board.

15. Fakie Kick Turn

Fakie kick turns take normal kick turns up one level and are a great stepping stone to build from. In your normal foot position, start rolling backward to get into fakie. An easy way to do this is to roll up and down a small bank.

Once you’re rolling backward, lift up the nose of your board by pressing on the tail and rotate your hips and shoulders 180° in one movement. This will put you back in a forward riding position.

16. Board Pop-Ups

The pop-up is another means of picking up your skateboard without needing to bend down to it. While your skateboard is on the ground, quickly press down on the tail to generate enough pop to lift the board vertically. As the board lifts up, grab the nose with your hand and walk away with style.

17. Shuv-It

There are tons of variations to shuv-its, but to start, you don’t need to worry about popping. While in your normal riding stance, press down on the tail just enough to lift up the front trucks. At the same instance, push your back foot behind you to rotate the board under your feet as you jump. Your skateboard will do a full 180 while you’re in the air before you land back on it in your normal riding stance again.

It’s common for the board to accidentally flip when you do this trick. To prevent this, try to isolate the movement of the shuv-it to your back foot instead of pushing the board with your front foot.

18. Nollie Shuv-It

A nollie shuv-it is the same type of trick as a regular shuv-it, except it’s done from the nose rather than the tail. For some people, this version of shuv-its feel easier at first, but for me, I found it more awkward. I guess you’ll have to try for yourself to see which version you prefer!

19. Frontside 180

Frontside 180’s are a 180° turn rotating in the direction of your heels. For goofy skaters, that means you rotate to the right while regular skaters rotate left.

This trick can be learned well before you ever learn to ollie and was one of the first popped tricks I ever learned on a skateboard. To help bring your board around and keep it on your feet, hanging your front toes off the deck helps a lot. That way your heel can guide your board around and leaves your foot in a nice position at the end of the trick.

20. Ollie

The ollie is one of the most foundational skateboarding tricks. This trick allows you to jump with your skateboard to get onto different features, rails, or ledges too. To start, you can practice on grass until you feel comfortable with the motion. From there, try to master stationary ollies before trying them moving to guarantee the most success.

Transition Skateboard Tricks For Beginners

Now that you’ve learned 20 flat ground tricks to try, here are some beginner tricks to try in bowls, quarter pipes, and mini ramps!

21. Drop-Ins

Dropping in is the most important skill to learn when skating transitions. It allows you to get immediate speed and makes it possible to carve around a bowl too. Although this trick isn’t overly difficult on paper, it can be very intimidating. So to start, opt for a smaller-sized quarter pipe without too steep of an angle. Once you’re comfortable with the smaller transitions, you can work your way up to the larger ones when you’re ready.

The only key to this trick is to press down hard and commit to rolling away. You can see my guide to learn how to drop in here for further tips!

22. Kick Turns On Quarter Pipes

Earlier I mentioned kick turns on flat ground, but this takes it up another level. With the same movement as a regular kick turn on flat, this trick allows you to change direction while you’re riding up a quarter pipe. This can be used to go back and forth on a mini ramp, or simply to change how you roll away from a transition.

For most beginner skaters it’s easier to turn backside (towards your toes). Once that feels dialed in, you can try kick turning frontside (towards your heels) to open more doors in your transition skating.

23. Rock N Roll

A rock n roll is a great progression trick after you’ve learned to kick turn on a quarter pipe. The only difference is that you let your front wheels go over the coping and get hung up on the deck. Then as your momentum wants to take you can down the ramp, press down on your tail and rotate your hips, shoulders, and skateboard to point forwards down the ramp once again.

24. Rock To Fakie

Before trying this trick you should feel comfortable rolling up and down a ramp into fakie. Once you feel comfortable with that, take a bit more speed so your front wheels go over the coping. Then, rather than turning like a rock n roll, lift up your front wheels to clear the coping and press back down again. Now you’ll be rolling down the ramp fakie after being temporarily hung up on the coping!

25. Axle Stall

Axle stalls are when you stall both the front and rear trucks on the coping of a ramp. The easiest way to think of these is like a 90° kick turn right as you near the coping. This will land both your trucks on the top of the ramp and your wheels will pinch against the coping to keep you in place. To go back down the ramp, kick turn back into it while leaning forward and pressing down.

26. Tail Stall

Tail stalls are easiest to do on a half-pipe or mini ramp where you are going back and forth. As you roll up the quarter pipe fakie, wait for your rear wheels to get close to the coping. Just before they reach, press down on your tail to stand up on the edge of the quarter pipe. This will leave you in the same position as when you’re about to drop in. From there, just drop back into the ramp and roll away.

27. Backside Or Frontside Carving

Carving is when you basically ride around the transitions in a bowl or pool. Rather than doing tricks along the coping, carving is the movement of rolling around the bowl while keeping speed. There are backside and frontside carves, but most people find backside carves easier to learn. As you get more comfortable with it, you can use carving and pumping to pick up speed in a bowl without ever needing to push.

28. Fly Outs

Airing out of a bowl, also known as fly outs, is when you come out of a quarter pipe or bowl and land back on the deck. These can be as big or small as you want them, but just learning to carry speed up and out of a quarter pipe is a good starting point. As long as you lift your knees up as you exit the quarter pipe, your board will stay on your feet with surprising ease.

29. 5-0 Stall

5-0 stalls take an axle stall to the next stage by stalling only on your rear trucks. It’s basically like holding a manual on coping since all your weight is balanced over the rear truck. These stalls can feel a bit spooky and committing at first, but once you get the hang of the stall, it’s surprisingly easy to kick turn back in, and roll away.

Again, make sure to start small with these and progress to bigger ramps as you feel more comfortable.

30. Spine Transfers

Although not every skatepark will have a spine to practice on, this is a useful trick to make the most of your transition skating. Spines are two quarter pipes back to back with double coping on the top. In most cases, you can just roll up and press forward to balance on top if you have enough speed. From there, just lean forward to drop into the other side and successfully transfer onto the other side of the spine!

More Challenging Beginner Skateboard Tricks To Try

Now that you have a wide array of tricks in the bag for both flat ground and transition skating, here are some more challenging ones to try.

31. Fakie Big Spin

A fakie big spin is a fakie 360 shuv-it with a body varial. Now that sounds like a lot, but it’s surprisingly easy and looks awesome. The key to this trick is to do it in one movement. As you pop and scoop the shuv it, begin rotating your body at the same time. This extra movement makes it easier to rotate the fakie 360 shuv without the entire movement being isolated to your foot.

32. Nollie

A nollie is an ollie that is popped off of your nose. It’s easier than a switch ollie even though the movement is the same. To do this trick, place your front foot over the nose and your back foot just inside the rear bolts. In one movement, press down on the nose to pop the nollie, then slide your back foot up the board as you lift both feet. This will take some practice to get right, but is one of my favorite tricks to pop off any feature.

33. Backside 180

Backside 180’s are harder than frontside 180’s for most beginner skateboarders. However, the key here is to rotate your hips and shoulders while you scoop your back foot around the rotation. This helps to guide the board and complete the rotation without it leaving your feet. Just be aware that you do land blind with this trick which can take some getting used to!

34. Kickflip

To flick a kickflip, you need to slide your front foot up and out on the heel edge of your skateboard. This means the rotation is flicked with your toes rather than your heels. To get the flip all the way around, aim to flick in the pocket of the nose for the best rotation.

This is a more advanced trick that can take some people much longer than a day to learn. However, if you dedicated a full day to learning kickflips you’d have a pretty good chance of landing a few.

35. Heelflip

Heelflips are a similar movement to kickflips, except you flick out from the toe edge of your skateboard to make your heel initiate the flip. Some beginners find heelflips easier to learn than kickflips as they are easier to keep under your body as you jump. Once again, like a kickflip, aim to flick your heel in the pocket to get the fastest rotation.

If you ever have a hard time committing to flip tricks like this, try practicing on some grass before taking it to concrete!

36. Backside Boardslide

A backside boardslide is the ultimate first rail trick for beginner skaters to learn. This is when you slide in the middle of your board with your body facing forward. It’s important to first have frontside 180’s down before trying this trick since you are doing a partial frontside rotation to get into this slide.

37. Frontside 50-50 Grind

50-50 grinds are the first ledge grinds most skaters will learn since it’s just an ollie onto a ledge with both trucks grinding at the same time. The difficulty of this trick is actually getting both trucks locked into the ledge. A workaround to this is coming at the ledge at a slight angle so that you jump up, over, and onto the ledge.

To start, you can try getting into these grinds while stationary on a curb. Once you feel confident with the movement, you can try it moving on a well-waxed ledge.

38. 180 No Comply

180 no comply’s are much easier and more natural than a regular no comply which is why I’d suggest trying the 180 variations first. While moving slowly, slide your front foot off the board to plant it on the ground. By doing this, your board will naturally pop due to the only weight being your back foot on the tail. As it pops, just rotate your hips and shoulders 180° while pushing the tail of your board forward. After the rotation is complete, lift your planted front foot back on the skateboard and roll away.

It really is easier than it looks!

39. Fakie Half Cab

A fakie half cab is basically a fakie backside 180. While rolling fakie, pop your tail and rotate your hips and shoulders in the direction of your toes. Try to think of your front foot as a “guide” to your skateboard during the rotation to ensure it sticks to your feet.

I always liked to think of these as a fakie kick turn that you pop. It made it easier in my head to think of it that way at first, so hopefully, it does for you too.

40. Switch Ollie

A switch ollie is the exact same movement as a normal ollie but in your opposite stance. That means if you’re goofy you will stand in a regular stance and vice versa. If you get confused by stances, this guide to skateboard stances will clear it up.

A good way to practice the movement of switch ollies is to get good at nollies. Some beginners find it easier to practice nollies first, then just imagine switch ollies as a similar movement.

41. Switch Shuv-It

Just like a switch ollie, a switch shuv it is the same as a regular shuv it but in the opposite stance. If you can already do nollie shuv it’s you’ll likely find this switch trick pretty easy. This one is great to throw into a game of SKATE with friends when you don’t have a big bag of tricks.

42. Switch Frontside 180

Switch frontside 180s still rotate in the direction of your heels, but this time in relation to your switch stance. This is a great trick to practice to help feel more comfortable with nollie 180s in the future.

43. Ollie Onto A Curb Or Box

To take your ollies to the next level, doing them onto a small feature like a curb is a great testing ground. It’s often easier to start by coming at the curb diagonally rather than straight on at first. This lessens the chance of hanging up your back trucks and feels less scary than going straight at the curb.

Once you feel that curbs are too easy, you can take this onto bigger boxes and ledges, or even try stacking skateboards to ollie over.

44. Frontside Boardslide

Frontside boardslides are the opposite of a backside boardslide since you are sliding on the rail or ledge backward. It’s helpful to know how to backside 180 before learning this trick, but not essential. To make this trick easier to land, make sure to look over your shoulder to the end of the rail as you slide. This way you’re more likely to stand up straight and will know exactly when to turn out of the slide.

45. Frontside Shuv-It

Last but not least, the frontside shuv it is a slightly harder version of a regular shuv it. This time rather than scooping your back foot behind you, you push it forward to rotate the board 180° in the opposite direction. This trick usually makes the board land slightly behind you, so it’s helpful to jump slightly back as you pop the trick to land over your board.

Happy Shredding!