Table Tennis Rules - Service and Score

Do you really know the rules regarding indoor table tennis? Or do you just THINK you know them? Well, we shall see. I’m about to explain a few rules to you including some of which you might have never heard about before. In order to win a match, a player must have won 3 out of five games. In order to win a game, he must have won 11 points. That’s right, not 21 points. That rule has changed a while ago.

Okay, so again, a player needs 11 points to win a game and he/she needs to have 2 points more than the opponent. So for example, let’s say the score is 9:9. If you make two more points, the game is yours. But if the score is 10:10, you also need two more points in order to win the game. That means theoretically, a final score could be 17:15. So let me sum that up for you again:

A player needs 3 out of five games to win an indoor table tennis match.

In order to win a game, a player needs to score 11 points minimum AND 2 points more than his opponent.

Now let’s move on two the next rule. The service rule for table tennis. Most of the people got that wrong, too. Before you start a match, each player picks a side and coin will to be flipped. If you picked the right side, you have the right to start with the service.

However, that doesn’t mean that you have to actually use your right. Maybe you feel more comfortable to start a new match by returning your opponent’s service. In that case you can hand over the right of serve to your opponent. If your opponent was guessed right on the coin flip, it’s exactly the other way around.

Once it is decided who starts the match, he has two services. And then it keeps alternating all throughout the game, always two services at a time. The old rule was five services per player each times, but that was when a game still consisted of 21 points. Okay, so let’s say your opponent won the right of service to start the first game.

Once the first game is finished, you will have the right of services to start the second game. And for the third game, it will go back to your opponent and so forth.