Dressage training and competition involve welfare considerations around training methods, equipment use, and the pressure horses experience in competitive contexts.
Dressage horse welfare involves the spectrum from the sport at its best — where highly trained horses work in harmony with sensitive riders — to its worst, where horses are physically forced into positions and movements through pain and coercion. Equipment use is a welfare indicator: correctly fitting, appropriate bits and well-adjusted saddles are prerequisites for welfare-appropriate training. Training method welfare is harder to assess: the classical dressage ideal of light aids, clear communication, and reward-based progression represents welfare-aligned practice, while forceful, repetitive drilling, hyperflexion, and excessive spurring represent welfare violations. Competition pressures — producing high scores through technically correct but biomechanically stressful movements — can drive training toward welfare compromise. The FEI has strengthened rules around abusive practices but enforcement remains inconsistent. Welfare assessment frameworks for competition horses increasingly include behavioral welfare indicators alongside physical health metrics.