From Traditional Martial Art to Phygital Sport: A Technology-Convergence Framework for the Digital Transformation of Taekwondo

Taekwondo has progressively incorporated electronic scoring, video replay, wearable sensing, artificial intelligence (AI)-based motion analysis, and immersive training. However, these technologies are commonly studied as isolated tools rather than as components of an integrated physical–digital sport system. This structured integrative review synthesizes taekwondo-specific research, recent sport-technology literature, and foundational engineering studies available through August 2026 to develop a conceptual framework for Phygital Taekwondo. We define Phygital Taekwondo as a closed-loop sport ecosystem in which physical practice and competition are captured through sensing, transformed into task-relevant digital representations, interpreted through AI and motion intelligence, and returned to athletes and other stakeholders through feedback, simulation, decision support, or shared interaction. The framework connects athletes, coaches, referees, venues, spectators, broadcasters, and governing organizations across physical and digital environments. Applications are organized across training and coaching, competition and performance analysis, officiating support, broadcasting and spectatorship, and connected participation. Major constraints include high-speed tracking and occlusion, end-to-end latency, interoperability, privacy and cybersecurity, explainability, fairness, and standardization. The review therefore positions digital transformation as a sport-system integration problem and proposes boundary conditions, operational design principles, a five-level validation hierarchy, and a staged research roadmap for trustworthy, adaptive, and scalable phygital taekwondo systems.