Most martial arts don't let.... you are getting your information for the wrong places. First, martial arts style do not decide who spars who. The instructor does. Unfortunately many of the commercial schools are nothing more than baby sitting services. Many schools no longer have teeth. By that i mean they are shackled by the threat of being sued if someone gets injured. The insurance companies that insure martial arts schools don't want anyone to make contact. They require that all student wear so much protective gear that they can't fight naturally. No contact or touch contact is the general rule. Instructors are more interested in making money and keeping students coming than in teaching realistic self-defense. so in general you are right that many schools restrict what goes on. But, there are a few schools that do things like they have been for decades. They usually can;t be found in a shopping center where most people go to class. The good schools are getting harder and harder to find. They meet in recreation centers, at someone home, or other non-commercial location. So the problem is the way people run their schools, not the styles themselves.

Edit: Yes tournaments are divided with male and female divisions for fighting. But, martial arts schools may or may not do that. I know of one woman that is about 5' or 5"1" tall. She is tiny. However, she will not back down from anyone that here Sensei puts her on the floor with. I have seen here totally destroy guys much bigger than her.

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This has nothing to do with which martial arts. It has to do with which schools. It is up to the instructor of a school whether or not men and women will spar against one another. In many schools they will. Often there are as many women in classes as men. Sometimes they have no choice but to spar against the men. As a general rule most schools will tell the women this is good for you to spar against a man. Because if they are assaulted it will likely be a male. If they are used to fighting against males it won't be a problem fighting one outside of the school.

Edit:

You are confusing the art with tournament play. Tournaments are sports. It is not the art. It the dojo, dojang etc you fight everyone. You train with everyone. There are no weight divions in the school. Most tournaments don't have weight divisions. Additionally some tournaments do have girls and boys in the same division. I've had female students that have fought males and beat them. One student in particular got disqualified for excessive contact. We told her not to worry about it just keep fighting. Maybe that was one of his students or his friend student. The only way for him to win is to disqualify her....lol

I had another female student that was a teen. They always made her fight adult women and men. She beat them all. She is also the student that put 2 men in the hospital that was trying to rape her. She went off to the military after she graduated. She stopped by our school a couple weeks ago. She brought her nephew with her. She is supposed to come back and train and for him to train. A lot of people say they are coming back and don't but we will see what she does. She had been in our dojo in years. She didn't think we would remember her. But we know her.

I've been in karate classes where I've been the only woman. If there's sparring going on, I'm not going to be excluded because I'm the only chick there, and my senseis won't exclude me on that basis.

At competition I'm pitted against other women of a similar age and ability to myself, because that's a competition. In class, or at a grading, I'm pitted against anyone. Older, younger, bigger, smaller, male, female, sometimes two-on-one. If you're at a martial arts school that isn't teaching what you want to learn, change schools.

Judging by your response to Pugpaws, it looks like you are looking for a competition which allows male vs female fights?

A martial art dojo can set certain sparring rules, such as males vs females. You will not usually find a competition, tournament, etc that pits males vs females or anyone greater than 20 pounds against each other. It's not against their insurance policies, so to speak.

If it is actual practical defense against various scenarios you are looking for, you would do better to look up Chiron training or Target Focus Training. The competitions are not designed for practical skills so much as entertainment and performance (athletic).

Most legit martial arts should. Sparring is a training tool more than a practice scenario so if it's done correctly, there shouldn't be an issue with size or strength.

Just off the top of my head: boxing, jui jistsu, kick boxing, wrestling, tae kwon do, etc.

all martial arts lets you spar against any size or gender, they dont have weight class, unless its being taught as a sport.

wrestling, boxing are martial sports and not martial arts. very few karate competition have weight classes, some of them have gender class but not all.

most karate and taekwon do training is not geared towards sport and have dont use those categories during training

Martial arts is first and foremost taught for self defense. This means that people of all sizes and gender should learn to be able to defend themselves against other people of all sizes and gender. If you are failing to do this then you are not truly learning how to defend yourself.

I dont know where you are getting your information but the majority of places have classes combined and the only time it is ever separated is in tournaments or some classes are targeted at solely women to try and build their confidence to join classes with men.

I do hapkido, which is a variant of Tae kwon do and and judo, and I've never been restricted as to who to spar with. I recommend it.

there is a REASON why in general men and women dont mix

we have seperate bathrooms , seperate sport leagues ,etc etc

not to mention right down to the genetic level

having cleared that up to best case scenerio is just dont waste your money

on a dojo ,instead be proficient on your whereabouts and have a curfew if possible

When i practiced muay thai i would spar against everyone, the people whom had been there for years, women, old men, teenage girls and boys. All muay thai schools are different though

Most martial arts don't let you spar with the opposite gender or heavier opponents.

Isn't that just saying, "Yes, we can teach you to defend yourself... if they're also female and a lightweight. But if its a rapist, mugger, etc. who's male/stronger than you - you're screwed."???

I want to be able to defend myself from ANY opponent. Even if it's just a chance to run away.

So which martial arts let you spar with the opposite gender and heavier opponents during training?

They only divy up the guys and girls in tournaments to make it more fair in competition but in the dojo everybody goes. Which is great for the girls. They get to go all out in the dojo and then it is easy to cream everybody in the competition. I have never been in a martial arts school where they did not let the girls spar the guys. Quite the opposite since there are almost always more guys to spar girls than there is girls to spar guys.

It depends on the school, not the style. Each school sets its own rules.

BJJ