With the introduction of firearms the bow as a weapon was neglected, and almost died out all together until Honda Toshizane, a kyudo instructor at Tokyo Imperial University, combined elements of the warrior style and the court ceremonial style into a hybrid style which ultimately became known as the Honda Ryu (Honda martial school). This style found great favor with the general public and he is generally credited with saving Japanese Archery from oblivion. With the American occupation banning of all martial art instruction, traditional kyujutsu schools declined further. When the ban was lifted, Kyudo, as opposed to kyujutsu, became widely practiced and the Zen Nihon Kyudo Federation (All Japan Kyudo Federation) was established in 1953, publishing the standard kyudo textbook called the Kyohon, and overseeing Kyudo development both in Japan and internationally up to the present time. There now exists a European Kyudo Federation which has annual seminars and promotion tests, and in 1993 the first such seminar and promotion test was held in America in San Jose, California.

By such diligent practice Confucian theory teaches that the archer will become morally good (Zen), and this sincerity of personality will excite the aesthetic sense of anyone watching at an intuitive, emotional level, giving the performance a beauty derived not only from the technical skill of the archer but also from the archer's emotional maturity and spiritual sincerity.

All students, no matter which instructor or school, will shoot the same design of Japanese bow which is little changed from the twelfth century. Traditionally made of hardwoods, laminated front and back with bamboo, the Japanese bow is one of the longest in the world, usually over seven feet in length. It is a natural double recurve bow with the arrow knocked one third of the way from the bottom, and the bow actually rotating in the hand at release approx. 270 degrees. The unique design of the bow requires that the bow actually be torqued or twisted in full
draw to make the arrow fly straight.

There were dozens of traditional schools before World War II, and many of them survive today provoking endless debate as to the superiority of one over the other. In fact, some traditional schools still do not use the word kyudo, preferring the word kyujutsu instead to describe their teachings. Some styles heavily emphasize the spiritual aspect of shooting, and some proponents of Zen Archery view kyudo as a way to further their own spiritual development in Zen Buddhism.