The foil is a light and flexible weapon, originally developed in the mid 17th century as a training weapon for the smallsword (a light one-handed sword designed almost exclusively for thrusting).

The target area is restricted to the torso. Hits can be scored only by hitting the valid target surface with the point of the weapon in such a manner as would have caused a puncture wound, had the weapon been sharp. If you hit your opponent with any part of the foil other than the tip, it does not count. A touch on an off-target area stops the bout but does not score a point. There are right of way or priority rules, whose basic idea is that the first person to create a viable threat or the last person to defend successfully receives a 'right' to hit. If two hits arrive more or less simultaneously, only the fencer who had the 'right of way' receives a point. If priority cannot be assigned unambiguously, no points are awarded. The original idea behind the foil rules was to encourage the fencers to defend and attack vital areas, and to fight in a methodical way with initiative passing back and forth between the combatants and thus minimizing the risk of a double death.

Epee, as the sporting weapon we know today, was invented in the second half of the 19th century by a group of French students, who felt that the conventions of foil were too restrictive, and the weapon itself too light; they wanted an experience closer to that of an actual duel. At the point of its conception, the epee was, essentially, an exact copy of a smallsword but without the needle-sharp point. Instead, the blade terminated in a point d'arret, a three-pronged contraption, which would snag on the clothing without penetrating the flesh.

Like the foil, the epee is a thrusting weapon: to score a valid hit, the fencer must fix the point of his weapon on his opponent's target. However, the target area covers the entire body, and, there are no rules regarding who can hit when (unlike in foil and sabre, where we have priority rules). In the event of both fencers making a touch within 40 milliseconds of each other, both are awarded a point (a double hit), except when the score is equal and the point would mean the win for both, such as at in the modern pentathlon one-hit epee, where neither fencer receives a point. Otherwise, the first to hit always receives the point, regardless of what happened earlier in the phrase.

Sabre is the 'cutting' weapon: points may be scored with edges and surfaces of the blade, as well as the point. Although the current design with a light and flexible blade (marginally stiffer than a foil blade) appeared around the turn of the 19th and 20th century, similar sporting weapons with more substantial blades had been used throughout the Victorian era.

There is some debate as to whether the modern fencing sabre is descended from the cavalry sabres of Turkic origin (which became popular in Central and Western Europe around the time of Napoleonic Wars) or one of Europe's indigenous edged duelling weapons, such as the cutting rapier. In practice, it is likely to be a hybrid of the two. Most of the conventions and vocabulary of modern sabre fencing were developed by late 19th and early 20th century masters from Italy and Hungary, perhaps most notable among them being Italo Santelli (1866–1945).

The sabre target covers everything above the waist, except the hands (wrists are included) and the back of the head. Today, any contact between any part of the blade and any part of the target counts as a valid touch. Like foil, sabre is subject to right of way rules, but there are some differences in the precise definition of what constitutes a correctly executed attack and parry. These differences, together with a much greater scoring surface (the whole of the blade, rather than the point alone), make sabre parries more difficult to execute effectively. As a result, sabre tactics rely much more heavily on footwork with blade contact being kept to a minimum.