WAKO, the amateur code, and the Olympic question
The organisation with by far the most participants is one most fans could not name, and it is the only part of kickboxing with a plausible route into the Olympic programme.
The World Association of Kickboxing Organizations was founded in the 1970s and now runs the largest amateur structure in the sport, with national federations, age categories and a world championship cycle. Most people who compete in kickboxing anywhere in the world do so under WAKO rules, not K-1's.
WAKO's design choice was to keep multiple disciplines rather than pick one. Point-fighting is semi-contact and stopped after each exchange. Light contact runs continuously with power restrained. Kick-light and full contact are above-the-waist only, in the American lineage. Low kick adds leg kicks. K-1 rules add knees and a brief clinch. A single national team may field competitors in all of them, and they are genuinely different sports.
That breadth is why WAKO holds the sport's only realistic Olympic pathway. It received IOC recognition and has been through the provisional-recognition process, which requires exactly the things professional promotions lack: anti-doping compliance, a global federation structure, and a scoring system that survives external scrutiny.
The tension is obvious. The version of kickboxing most likely to reach the Olympics is the amateur, point-scored, protective-equipment version — which is the version almost no professional fan watches.