Climbing holds for a home wall

Holds are the part everyone shops for first. They are also the part most likely to arrive as the wrong bolt for a UK adult wall. Shop the bolt, then the shape.

The families, in the order you will miss them

• Jugs are positive. A new wall that is all edges and slopers is a wall nobody warms up on. A starter set is mostly jugs and comfortable edges.
• Edges are the flat lips you stand on and pull on. Depth is measured in millimetres by serious makers. A "medium edge" with no depth on the packet is a guess.
• Slopers are rounded. They need friction, which means skin, chalk and an angle that has not already dumped your weight onto your feet. They are a poor first hold on a steep board.
• Pockets and crimps are where fingers get hurt. A home wall does not need a 10 mm crimp in month one. Leave them until the wall is otherwise finished and you already hangboard with a plan that is not this website's.
• Footholds can be smaller and more numerous than hand holds. Screw-on footholds and bolt-on footholds are different hardware. Moon sells both ideas for different setups.
• Volumes are large shapes, usually several bolts, that move your body off the panel. They belong on a skin and a frame that can take a big lever. The volumes note covers bolts and dust.

A useful first set is boring on purpose. You can add worse holds. You cannot enjoy a wall you cannot get off the ground on.

How many

The planner suggests 8 holds per square metre, rounded up to the next 5. On the default example, a panel a little over 6 m² lands on 55 holds. That is a sparse set: room for feet, room to change a problem, and not a hold in every T-nut. Specialist makers sell sets of 20, 40 and upwards. Two modest sets of different shapes beat one enormous set of identical jugs.

The bolt is the specification

Moon's metric panels and the usual UK adult hold are M10. The T-nut has to be M10 too. The materials page links a 100-pack of zinc-plated M10 nuts whose maker specifies a 12 mm hole.

ALPIDEX 100 M10 T-nuts

Read the hold listing for the thread before you drill. A lot of inexpensive "climbing holds" on Amazon UK are sold for children's play frames. Listings in that aisle often include a smaller bolt, a weight limit aimed at a child, and hardware that will not meet an M10 grid. That can be a fair toy. It is the wrong object for an adult training wall. If the page does not state M10, assume you have not found an adult set yet.

Specialist shops and hold makers sell M10 polyurethane sets with a stated size and a bolt length that matches the hold. Rock+Run is one UK shop that carries them. Makers such as Crusher Holds sell direct. We have not tested those sets, and this page does not rank them. The check is dull and sufficient: M10, a dimension, a bolt length, and a material that is a climbing hold rather than a playground lump.

Texture and skin

Polyurethane holds from climbing brands are textured. A smooth plastic jug from a toy set feels different and, on a steep wall, worse. Texture also wears skin. A home wall used three evenings a week will teach you that faster than a gym, because you repeat the same holds. Start positive, keep the bad holds for later, and stop a session when skin or a finger pulley is the thing you are training. This is not medical advice. Pain in a finger is a reason to stop and, if it persists, to ask a clinician, not to add a smaller edge.