Often referred to as "meditation in motion", tai chi aims to concentrate and balance the body's qi (vital energy), providing benefits to mental and physical health.

Since the late twentieth century, pinyin has been officially adopted in China and replaced Wade–Giles as the most popular system for romanizing Chinese.

[note 2] However, as the Wu (Hao) founders had no financial need to promote their art, their contributions to the "tai chi classics" were not distributed widely for many years.

The first public association between taiji and the art was a poem by Imperial Court scholar Weng Tonghe describing a tai chi performance by Yang Luchan.

[16][17][18][14] By the second decade of the twentieth century, Yang Chengfu's disciples and Sun Lutang were using the term taijiquan in their publications, including in the titles of some of the tai chi classics.

[20] Early tai chi texts include embedded quotations from early Chinese classics like the I Ching, Great Learning, Book of Documents, Records of the Grand Historian, and Zhuangzi, as well as from famous Chinese thinkers like Zhu Xi, Zhou Dunyi, and Mencius.

[21][20] Tai chi also draws on Chinese theories of the body, particularly Taoist neidan (internal alchemy) teachings on qi (vital energy) and on the three dantian.

Cheng Man-ch'ing emphasizes the Taoist background of tai chi and states that it "enables us to reach the stage of undifferentiated pure yang, which is exactly the same as Laozi's 'concentrating the qi and developing softness'".

[20] Tai chi's path is one of developing naturalness by relaxing, attending inward, and slowing mind, body, and breath.

[20] A key aspect of tai chi philosophy is to work with the flow of yin (softness) and yang (hardness) elements.

Laozi provided the archetype for this in the Tao Te Ching when he wrote, "The soft and the pliable will defeat the hard and strong.

[20] This entails learning a routine sequence of movements that emphasize a straight spine, abdominal breathing and a natural range of motion.

[27] There are also numerous other supporting solo practices such as:[20] There is no scientific evidence for the existence of qi,[29] nor any demonstrating the effectiveness of acupressure[30][31][32] or traditional Chinese medicine[33][34] beyond that of placebo treatment.

While tai chi is typified by its slow movements, many styles (including the three most popular: Yang, Wu, and Chen) have secondary, faster-paced forms.

[20][37] Modern historians point out that the earliest reference indicating a connection between Zhang Sanfeng and martial arts is actually a 17th-century piece called Epitaph for Wang Zhengnan (1669), composed by Huang Zongxi (1610–1695).

[38] The other four contemporary traditional tai chi styles (Yang, Sun, Wu and Wu/Hao) trace their teachings back to Chen village in the early 1800s.

Martial arts historian Xu Zhen claimed that the tai chi of Chen Village was influenced by the Taizu changquan style practiced at nearby Shaolin Monastery, while Tang Hao thought it was derived from a treatise by Ming dynasty general Qi Jiguang, Jixiao Xinshu ("New Treatise on Military Efficiency"), which discussed several martial arts styles including Taizu changquan.

[43] This was an attempt to standardize tai chi for wushu tournaments as they wanted to create a routine that would be much less difficult to learn than the classical 88 to 108 posture solo hand forms.

[45] The five major styles of tai chi are named for the Chinese families who originated them: The most popular is Yang, followed by Wu, Chen, Sun, and Wu/Hao.

[46] Choy Hok Pang, a disciple of Yang Chengfu, was the first known proponent of tai chi to openly teach in the United States, beginning in 1939.

His son and student Choy Kam Man emigrated to San Francisco from Hong Kong in 1949 to teach tai chi in Chinatown.

[47][48] Sophia Delza, a professional dancer and student of Ma Yueliang, performed the first known public demonstration of tai chi in the United States at the New York City Museum of Modern Art in 1954.

She wrote the first English language book on tai chi, T'ai-chi Ch'üan: Body and Mind in Harmony, in 1961.

[51] Moy Lin-shin arrived in Toronto, Canada, from China in 1970, where he started teaching tai chi and related internal arts.

[52] Norwegian Pytt Geddes was the first European to teach tai chi in Britain, holding classes at The Place in London in the early 1960s.

No conclusive evidence showed benefit for most of the conditions researched, including Parkinson's disease, diabetes, cancer and arthritis.

[58] A 2020 review of 13 studies found that tai chi had positive effect on the quality of life and depressive symptoms of older adults with chronic conditions who lived in community settings.

Practitioners test their skills against students from other schools and martial arts styles in tuishou ("pushing hands") and sanshou competition.