Pickleball serving rules, explained

Pickleball's serve is deliberately weak. Unlike tennis, where the serve is the biggest weapon in the game, the rules here constrain it heavily so that rallies actually happen. The core requirements: underhand, below the waist, diagonal, and it must clear the kitchen.

The two legal serves

The volley serve (the traditional one)

You strike the ball out of the air, without letting it bounce. Three conditions apply:

• Contact below the waist. Specifically, below your navel level.
• Upward arc of the arm. The paddle must be moving upward at contact.
• Paddle head below the wrist. The highest point of the paddle head must be below the highest part of your wrist at contact.

Those three together define "underhand" in a way a referee can actually judge.

The drop serve

Added to the rules more recently and now a permanent option. You drop the ball from your hand (or off the paddle face) and hit it after it bounces. Crucially, you may not throw or propel the ball downward — it must be released and fall under gravity. It may bounce anywhere legal, and it may bounce more than once.

The upside: with a drop serve, the below-the-waist, upward-arc and paddle-below-wrist requirements do not apply. That makes it far easier to serve legally, which is why it is popular with beginners and with players whose shoulders do not enjoy the traditional motion.

Where you have to stand

At the moment you strike the ball:

• Both feet behind the baseline. Neither foot may touch the baseline or the court inside it.
• At least one foot on the ground behind the baseline.
• Within the imaginary extensions of the centerline and the sideline of the service court you are serving from.

There is no restriction on where you stand along the baseline other than those extensions, so you can serve from wide or from near the center.

Where the ball has to go

The serve must travel diagonally into the opposite service court. It must clear the net and clear the non-volley zone including its line — a serve landing on the kitchen line is a fault, though a serve landing on any other line of the correct service court is good. If it clips the net and still lands in the correct service court, play continues (there is no let in current pickleball rules).

The two-bounce rule follows every serve

This is not a serving rule exactly, but it applies immediately after every serve and it is the rule new players forget most.

The serve must bounce before the receiving side returns it, and the return must bounce before the serving side plays it. Two bounces, one per side, before anyone may volley. It exists to stop the serving team rushing the net behind a serve, which would hand them a permanent advantage.

Scoring and who serves

In traditional scoring, only the serving side can score. The score is called as three numbers in doubles — serving team's score, receiving team's score, and which server you are (1 or 2). At the start of a game, the first serving team gets only one server; after that, both partners serve before the ball goes over. Full detail in pickleball scoring.

You serve from the right (even) court when your score is even, and from the left (odd) court when it is odd. If you win the point, you swap sides with your partner and serve again from the other court.

Service faults: the full list

1. The ball lands in the non-volley zone or on its line.
2. The ball lands outside the correct diagonal service court.
3. The ball fails to clear the net.
4. A foot touches the baseline or the court at the moment of contact.
5. Contact above the waist, or with the paddle head above the wrist (volley serve only).
6. The ball is thrown or propelled downward on a drop serve.
7. The server swings and misses entirely after the toss on a volley serve.
8. Serving before the receiver is ready, or from the wrong court.

Note that in most recreational and tournament formats there is only one serve — no second serve as in tennis. A fault on the serve loses the serve.

What makes a good serve, given all that

Because the serve cannot be a weapon, its job is to start the point without giving anything away. That means deep — a serve landing near the receiver's baseline pushes them back and makes their return harder — and in, every time. Missing a serve is the cheapest possible way to lose a point, and beginners do it far too often chasing power they are not allowed to use anyway.

For the rest of the rules, see pickleball rules explained. For the other rule that shapes every rally, see the kitchen rule. And the authoritative source for all of it is USA Pickleball's official rulebook.