Trampolining is a competitive Olympic sport in which gymnasts perform acrobatics while bouncing on a trampoline. These can include simple jumps in the pike, tuck or straddle position to more complex combinations of forward or backward somersaults and twists.

In the early 1930s, George Nissen made the first modern trampoline in his garage after observing trapeze artistes performing tricks when bouncing off the safety net. He initially used it to help with his diving and tumbling activities.  He later formed a company to building trampolines to sale naming it after a variant of the Spanish word trampolin (diving board).

He used the trampoline to entertain audiences and also let them participate in his demonstrations as part of his marketing strategy. These were the beginnings of a new sport.

In the USA, trampolining was quickly introduced into school physical education and was also used in private entertainment centres. However, following a number of injuries and law suits caused by insufficient supervision and inadequate training, trampolining is now mostly conducted in specialist gyms with certified trainers. This has caused a large reduction in the number of competitive athletes.

Elsewhere in the world the sport was most strongly adopted in Europe and former Soviet Union. Since trampolining became an Olympic sport in 2000, many more countries have started developing programs and Japan and China are already producing very competitive athletes.

Competitive trampolining routines consist of combinations of 10 contacts with the trampoline bed combining varying rotations, twists and shapes with take-off and landing in one of four positions:

A routine must always start and finish on feet.

In addition to the 10 contacts with the bed in a routine, competitors are permitted up to one "out bounce", a straight jump to control their height at the end of a routine, before sticking the landing. The trampolinist must stop completely - this means that the bed must stop moving as well - and they have to hold still for a count of 3 seconds before moving.

In competitions, moves must usually be performed in one of the following 3 basic shapes:

A fourth 'shape', known as 'puck' because it appears to be a hybrid of pike and tuck, is often used in multiple twisting somersaults - it is typically used in place of a 'tuck' and in competition would normally be judged as an open tuck shape.

A straddle, or straddled pike is a variant of a pike with arms and legs spread wide and is only recognised as a move as a shaped jump and not in any somersault moves.

Rotation is performed about the body's longitudinal and lateral axes, producing twists and somersaults respectively. Twists are done in multiples of a half, and somersaults in multiples of a quarter. Rotation around the dorso-ventral axis is also possible (producing side-somersaults and turntables), but these are not generally considered to be valid moves within competitions and carry no 'tariff' for difficulty.

The first individual trampolining competitions were held in colleges and schools.  In the early years of competition there was no defined format with performers often completing lengthy routines and even remounting if falling off partway through. Gradually competitions became more codified such that by the 1950s the 10-bounce routine was the norm.

The first World Championships were organised by Ted Blake of Nissen, and were held in London in 1964. The first World Champions were Americans Dan Millman and Judy Wills Cline. The first ever televised National Championships were held in England in 1958.

Soon after the first World Championships, an inaugural meeting of prominent trampolinists was held in Frankfurt to explore the formation of an International Trampoline Federation. In 1965 in Twickenham, the Federation was formally recognised as the International Governing Body for the sport.

In 1973, Ted Blake organised the first World Age Group Competition (WAG). These now run alongside the World Championships. Blake also used the first WAG as an opportunity to organise a World Trampoline Safety Conference which was held in the Bloomsbury Hotel, London, in order to codify safety concerns. There is also a World Cup circuit of international competitions which involves three competitions every year. There are also international matches between teams from several countries.

The International Trampolining Federation became part of the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique (FIG) in 1999. FIG is now the international governing body for the sport which is paired with Power tumbling as the skill sets overlap. International competitions are run under the rules of FIG. Individual national gymnastics organizations can make local variations to the rules in matters such as the compulsory and optional routines and number of rounds for national and local competitions.

As part of the agreement to merge FIT with FIG, individual trampolining was accepted into the Summer Olympic Games for 2000 as an additional gymnastic sport.

The currently accepted basic format for individual trampoline competitions usually consists of two or three routines, one of which may involve a compulsory set of skills. The skills consist of various combinations of somersaults, shaped bounces, body landings and twists performed in various body positions such as the tuck, pike or straight position.

The routines are performed on a standard 14 foot by 7 foot regulation sized trampoline with a central marker. Each routine consists of the athlete performing ten different skills starting and finishing on the feet. The routine is marked out of 10 by five judges with deductions for incomplete moves, moving too far from the centre mark or poor form. Usually the highest and lowest scores are discarded. Additional points can be added depending on the difficulty of the skills being performed. The degree of difficulty (tariff) is calculated by adding a factor for each half turn (or twist) or quarter somersault. Difficulty is important in a routine, however, there are differences in opinion between various coaches whether it is better to focus on increasing the difficulty of routines given that this usually results in a reduced form score or to focus on improving execution scores by displaying better form in an easier routine.