Pickleball rules, explained for beginners

Pickleball is played on a 20-by-44-foot court with a paddle and a perforated plastic ball. The serveis hit underhand and travels diagonally cross-court. After the serve, both sides must let the ball bounce once before hitting it out of the air — that's the two-bounce rule. Only the serving side can score points, games are played to 11 and you must win by 2, and you may not volley — hit the ball before it bounces — while standing in the 7-foot non-volley zonenext to the net, better known as the "kitchen." That's the whole game in a nutshell; the rest of this page fills in the details.

The official rulebook comes from USA Pickleball, the sport's national governing body. It runs to dozens of pages, but recreational players only need to understand a handful of core rules to play a fair, fun game. We'll cover each one below in the order it comes up during a point.

1. The serve

Every point starts with a serve. Pickleball serves are deliberately gentle so the game isn't decided by aces the way tennis often is. The core serve rules are:

1. Underhand.You must strike the ball with an upward, underhand swing. In a traditional ("volley") serve, contact has to happen below your waist (roughly navel height) and the highest point of the paddle head must stay below your wrist. A newer "drop serve" is also allowed: you drop the ball and hit it after it bounces, with no height restrictions.
2. Diagonal / cross-court. You serve from behind your baseline into the diagonally opposite service court. The serve must clear the net and the kitchen and land in the correct box — a serve that lands in the kitchen or on the kitchen line is a fault.
3. Feet behind the baseline.At the moment you strike the ball, both feet must be behind the baseline, and you can't step on or over it until after contact.

Unlike tennis, you only get one serve attempt— there is no "second serve." If the serve is a fault, you lose the serve (in doubles, it passes to your partner or the other team). A serve that clips the top of the net and still lands in the correct service court is simply played on.

2. The two-bounce rule (a.k.a. the double-bounce rule)

This is the rule that surprises every newcomer, and it's the one that makes pickleball play the way it does. After the serve:

1. The receiving side must let the serve bounce once before returning it.
2. The serving side must then let that return bounce once before hitting it.

In other words, the ball has to bounce once on each sidebefore anyone is allowed to volley (hit it out of the air). Only after those two bounces is the point "open" and players can start volleying. This rule stops the serving team from rushing the net and smashing the return, and it's what gives beginners time to get into a rally.

3. Scoring

Pickleball uses side-out scoring, which trips people up at first but is simple once it clicks. The key ideas:

• Only the serving side can score.If the serving side wins the rally, they get a point and serve again. If the receiving side wins the rally, no point is scored — they simply win the serve (a "side out") and their turn to serve begins.
• Games go to 11, win by 2. Standard recreational games are first to 11 points, but you must lead by at least 2, so a game can run to 12-10, 15-13, and so on. Tournament matches are often best-of-three; some events play to 15 or 21, always win by 2.

Calling the score (the three numbers)

In doubles you call the score out loud before every serve as three numbers: your team's score, the other team's score, and whether you are the first or second server (1 or 2). So "8-5-2" means your team has 8, the opponents have 5, and you are the second server of your team's turn.

Here's why that third number exists: in doubles, when your side wins the serve, both partners get to serve before the ball goes to the other team — except at the very start of the game, where the first serving team gets only one server (the game begins 0-0-2). When the first server faults, it becomes the second server's turn; when the second server faults, it's a side out and the other team serves. Singles scoring is simpler — you just call two numbers (your score, their score) — and your serving position is decided by your score: serve from the right when your score is even, from the leftwhen it's odd.

4. The kitchen explained (the non-volley zone)

The non-volley zone, universally called the "kitchen," is the 7-foot-deep area on each side of the net, running the full width of the court and marked by a line. The one rule that matters: you cannot volley while in the kitchen. A volley is any ball you hit out of the air before it bounces. If you strike a ball out of the air while standing in the kitchen — or even touching the kitchen line, or if your momentum carries you into the zone after the volley — it's a fault.

What you can do: step into the kitchen any time to hit a ball that has already bounced. Players often dart in to return a soft "dink" that lands in the kitchen, then step back out. The zone exists to stop players from camping at the net and spiking every ball, which forces the gentle, strategic dinking game pickleball is known for. When people say "stay out of the kitchen," they mean don't volley from inside it — being in the kitchen itself is perfectly legal.

5. Faults

A fault ends the rally. Depending on who committed it, a fault either scores a point for the serving team, or results in a loss of serve. The common faults a beginner will meet are:

• Hitting the ball into the net.
• Hitting the ball out of bounds.
• Volleying the ball (hitting it out of the air) while standing in or touching the kitchen.
• Volleying the ball before it has bounced once on each side (breaking the two-bounce rule).
• Serving into the net, into the wrong service court, or into the kitchen.
• Letting the ball bounce twice on your side before you return it.
• Touching the net with your paddle, body, or clothing while the ball is in play.

A note on lines: except for the kitchen line on a serve, a ball that lands on any line is in. Only the kitchen (non-volley zone) line counts as "out" for a serve.

6. Singles vs doubles

Most pickleball is played as doubles — two players a side — and all the rules above apply. Singlesuses the same court and the same core rules, with two simplifications: there's only one server per side (so you call just two numbers for the score), and your serving side (right or left) is set by whether your score is even or odd. Singles is far more of a running workout, since one person covers the whole 20-foot width.

That's the entire game. If you'd like to see how these rules come together in an actual point — where to stand, when to move up, and the soft game that wins at the net — read how to play pickleball. Ready to get on court? Our gear checklist covers everything you need to start.