10 Tips for Better Butterfly Swimming: Techniques, Drills and Beginner’s Guide
Butterfly is one of the four main competitive swimming strokes, alongside freestyle, breaststroke, and backstroke. It is recognised for its powerful simultaneous arm movements, dolphin kicking, and rhythmic body undulation.
Although butterfly is often considered one of the most physically demanding swimming strokes, learning the correct techniques can help swimmers develop better coordination, strength, and swimming efficiency.
Many beginners struggle with butterfly because they lift their heads too high, bend their knees excessively, mistime their dolphin kicks, or rely too heavily on upper-body strength.
However, butterfly swimming is not simply about swimming harder. Good butterfly technique requires the arms, legs, body, and breathing to work together in a coordinated rhythm.
At Friendly Dolphin Swim School, we help children and adults develop swimming techniques through progressive lessons that focus on water confidence, body coordination, and efficient movement.
In this guide, we explain how butterfly swimming works and share ten practical tips to improve your butterfly stroke.
Understand the Basic Butterfly Swimming Technique
Butterfly swimming involves simultaneous arm movements combined with a dolphin kick.
Unlike freestyle and backstroke, which use alternating arm movements, butterfly requires both arms to move together.
The legs also move together during the dolphin kick.
A typical butterfly stroke cycle includes:
- Both hands enter the water in front of the shoulders.
- The swimmer begins the underwater catch.
- Both arms pull and push water backwards.
- The arms recover simultaneously above the water.
- The body performs coordinated undulating movements.
- Dolphin kicks support propulsion and body positioning.
- The swimmer breathes at an appropriate point in the stroke cycle.
Learning each component separately can make butterfly easier to understand before attempting the complete stroke.
