How to Turn on a Skateboard: Kickturns and Carving

So you’ve got your board, you’ve managed to push off without face-planting, and you can roll along in a straight line without completely losing your mind. Brilliant. But now comes the bit that separates the people who actually learn to skate from those whose board ends up gathering dust under the bed — learning how to turn. Whether you’re riding along the seafront in Brighton, weaving through pedestrians near a park in Manchester, or sessioning your local skatepark in Edinburgh, being able to change direction is absolutely fundamental. Without it, you’re basically just a very slow, wobbly person heading towards a wall.

Turning on a skateboard isn’t one single thing. There are actually several ways to change direction, and each one has its place depending on your speed, your surface, and what you’re trying to achieve. This guide covers the two most essential methods for beginners: carving (also called leaning or pressure turning) and kickturns. Master these two, and you’ll have the control you need to actually go somewhere — and more importantly, to stop yourself going somewhere you don’t want to go.

Before You Start: Your Setup Matters

Turning is heavily influenced by how your board is set up, specifically how tight or loose your trucks are. Trucks are the metal axle assemblies underneath your deck, and they control how responsive your board is to your body weight shifting from side to side.

If your trucks are very tight, the board will feel stable but sluggish — hard to turn, which can actually be reassuring when you’re just starting out but becomes frustrating quickly. Loose trucks make the board turn more readily with less effort, but they can feel wobbly and unpredictable until you get used to them. Most beginners find a medium tightness works well as a starting point.

To adjust your trucks, you’ll need a skate tool — a cheap and essential bit of kit available from most skate shops. In the UK, shops like Slam City Skates in London, Route One (which has locations across the country as well as a solid online shop), and local independent shops stocked through distributors like Source BMX carry these for a few pounds. Tighten the kingpin nut (the large bolt in the centre of each truck) to stiffen things up, or loosen it for more turn. Make small adjustments and test as you go — half a turn at a time is plenty.

Also worth checking: are you riding with the right stance? Regular stance means your left foot is forward; goofy stance means your right foot leads. Neither is better — it’s just whatever feels natural. If you’re not sure, have a friend give you a gentle push from behind unexpectedly and whichever foot you put forward to steady yourself is likely your front foot. Knowing your stance matters for turning because heelside and toeside turns will feel very different depending on which way round you’re standing.

Carving: The First Turn You Should Learn

Carving is the most natural way to turn on a skateboard, and it’s likely the first technique that will actually click for you. The idea is simple: you shift your body weight towards your toes or your heels, the trucks respond by pivoting slightly, and the board curves in that direction. It’s a smooth, flowing movement — nothing sharp or sudden about it.

A toeside turn (leaning on your toes) curves the board in the direction you’re facing. A heelside turn (leaning back on your heels) curves it behind you. Which direction that actually is in the real world depends on your stance, but the mechanics are the same regardless.

Here’s how to practise carving properly:

1. Find a smooth, gentle slope or flat surface. A quiet car park on a Sunday morning is ideal. Avoid roads and busy paths — not just for safety, but because uneven surfaces will throw you off before you’ve had a chance to get a feel for the movement. Many UK leisure centres and retail parks have smooth tarmac that’s virtually empty at the right time of day.
2. Get rolling at a comfortable speed. You need a bit of momentum for carving to work. Too slow and the board barely responds; too fast and any wobble becomes harder to correct. A gentle push or two should be enough to start.
3. Stand in your normal riding position. Feet roughly over the bolts (the screws holding the trucks to the deck), knees slightly bent, weight centred. Relax your shoulders — tension travels straight down to your feet and makes everything worse.
4. Initiate the turn with your upper body first. Look in the direction you want to go and let your shoulders follow. This is the bit most beginners skip, and it’s a mistake. Your hips and feet will naturally follow your shoulders, which then shifts your weight to the correct side of the board.
5. Apply gradual pressure through your toes or heels. Don’t stamp or lunge — just a firm, steady shift of weight. Think about pressing down evenly across the edge of your foot rather than just the tip of your toes or the very back of your heel.
6. Hold the turn through the arc. Keep the pressure on until you’ve completed the direction change, then bring your weight back to centre. If you release too early, the board will straighten out before you’ve finished the turn.
7. Practise linking turns. Once you can carve one way reliably, try flowing from a toeside turn directly into a heelside turn and back again. This S-shaped path is the foundation of almost everything enjoyable about skateboarding.

The most common mistake beginners make with carving is leaning too far, too fast. If you throw your weight aggressively to one side, you’ll either shoot off the board or cause the wheels to grip suddenly and stop — neither of which is ideal. It’s a gradual thing. Think of it less like jerking a steering wheel and more like gently banking into a corner on a bicycle.

Carving is also the technique you’ll use most on longboards and cruiser boards, which are increasingly popular in the UK for getting around town. If you’re riding a wider, softer-wheeled cruiser rather than a standard popsicle-shaped street deck, carving will be even more pronounced and satisfying because softer wheels and looser trucks are typically part of that setup by design.

Kickturns: Turning When You’re Moving Slowly (or Not at All)

Carving relies on momentum and truck movement. But what happens when you’re moving slowly, or you need to make a sharper turn than your trucks will allow, or you want to change direction on a flat surface without much speed? That’s where kickturns come in.

A kickturn is when you lift the front wheels off the ground by pressing down on the tail of the board, pivot on your back wheels, and set the front wheels back down in a new direction. It’s a bit more technical than carving, but once it clicks, it feels brilliant — smooth, controlled, and genuinely useful in real situations.

Kickturns are what you’ll use at the top of a mini ramp when you want to change direction and come back down, for instance. They’re also essential for manoeuvring in tight spaces like a skatepark queue or a narrow path. And frankly, they just look good when done with confidence.

How to Do a Kickturn: Step by Step

Start by practising this standing still before you add any rolling movement. Seriously — it feels a bit silly standing on a stationary board in your garden, but it builds the muscle memory you need before speed is in the equation.

1. Stand on your board in your normal stance. Both feet over the bolts, knees bent, relaxed.
2. Move your back foot to the tail. The tail is the curved, angled end at the back of the board. Your back foot should sit across the tail with your toes pointing towards the side of the board. The ball of your foot should be roughly over the end of the tail.
3. Apply gentle downward pressure to the tail. Just enough to lift the front wheels slightly — maybe a centimetre or two off the ground. You’re not doing an ollie; you’re just creating a pivot point on your back wheels.
4. Use your shoulders and arms to guide the rotation. Swing your arms and upper body in the direction you want to turn. Your hips will follow, and the board — pivoting on those back wheels — will follow your hips.
5. Keep your weight over your back foot throughout the pivot. If you let your weight drift forward while the nose is up, you’ll lose control of the rotation and the board will shoot forward or sideways.
6. Set the front wheels down smoothly. Once you’ve rotated to the angle you want, ease off the tail pressure and let the front wheels come back down. Don’t drop them — guide them.
7. Rebalance and continue riding. The first few times, just focus on doing a 90-degree turn. As you get comfortable, try 180 degrees — turning to face the opposite direction completely.

Once you’ve got the feel for it stationary, try it while rolling very slowly. The movement is the same, but the momentum of the board adds a little extra challenge. Don’t try to do it at speed initially — a kickturn done wrong at speed can send you flying, which is considerably less enjoyable than it sounds.

One thing that trips up a lot of beginners is being too hesitant with the tail press. If you only barely
press the tail down, the nose won’t lift properly and you’ll end up scraping the front trucks along the ground rather than pivoting cleanly. Commit to it — press the tail down with purpose, shift your weight back, and let the board rotate beneath you. It feels awkward at first, but the movement quickly becomes instinctive with a bit of practice.

Carving is the natural companion to the kickturn, and in many ways it’s easier to pick up. Where a kickturn is a deliberate, snappy pivot, carving is a sustained lean that guides the board through a smooth arc. To carve, shift your weight onto your toes for a frontside carve or onto your heels for a backside carve, and let the trucks do the work. The key is to apply steady, even pressure rather than jerking your body — smooth weight distribution is what produces a clean, flowing turn rather than a wobble. Carving is particularly satisfying on a slight slope, where you can link turns together in a rhythmic back-and-forth motion that quickly starts to feel like second nature.

Both techniques feed into each other over time. Kickturns sharpen your understanding of weight distribution and board control, while carving builds confidence in committing to a direction mid-roll. Together they form the basis of virtually all directional movement in skateboarding, whether you’re navigating a crowded pavement, skating a bowl, or simply weaving between cones in a car park. Keep sessions short and consistent rather than long and infrequent — your muscles and balance will adapt faster that way, and you’ll notice real progress within a week or two of regular practise.

Turning is one of those skills that feels impossibly awkward right up until it doesn’t. Stick with it, stay low, and trust the board.