How long does it take to get noticeably good at karate/kung fu?

How long does it take to get good enough to be impressive? And to be able to defend yourself with ease and success?





Thanks to any answers :)|||Training 2-3 times a week will take longer than if you train 5-6 times a week.





Also, what are your natural talents, abilities, i.e., are you already in good shape? Are you athletic and coordinated? Are you strong?





These will factor into how long it takes.





It%26#039;s possible to %26quot;look good%26quot; in a few months if you answered yes to the questions above. Being practical on the street takes a little longer.





Kung Fu is generally circular and flowing in movement. It%26#039;s more like dance, with lots of grace required, but can still be an effective martial art.





Karate and Tae Kwon Do are typically more linear (north, south, east, west) in nature, and the movements are big and powerful. They are not as graceful looking as Kung Fu movements in my opinion, but I still like them both.|||A few year to get good, everybody learns different and it will depend on how much to train and how much you get into it, don%26#039;t know about defending yourself with ease, any fight would be hard even if you have been training for a while but martial arts should give you an edge mentaly and physicaly and that also depends on how much you train, how much you compete in tournaments





Kung Fu vs Karate, well they are both equal on the scale of McDojos and good schools, you%26#039;ll just have to pick the best place in your area, there are good karate schools and good kung fu schools, they have different philosophys like karate, what i do, is basicaly take them out as quickly as possible with straight techniques, so you work alot on developing the most power from your body, I train with a friend who does Wing Chun and his philosophy is more of grab to counter/punch/move and then repeat or keep attacking and overwhelm the guyn with punches, its more moving around than karate is





Just do some research and decide what you like, but if you have a choice of going to a good school in your area vs a bad one choose the good one even if it was your second favorite choice of style|||1: no martial art is better then the other, different styles of karate and kung fu vary amongst themselves each has its own set of strengths and weaknesses.





2: It depends on how good the class is. I soak up knowledge, so i got good to the degree i could apply stuff i%26#039;d learnt into good self defense after about 4months of training. Some people its sooner, others its longer. Its all depends.





3: I said before taht was to apply what i%26#039;d learnt into actual defense. BUT if you want to be noticeably good, it would probably take around a year. minimum.|||Just give it time and you will progress...