Padel rules
Padel rules made simple
You can learn padel in 10 minutes. Here are the key rules – each with a little animation so you can see straight away how it looks on court.
The court
A padel court is 20 m long and 10 m wide; a net splits it into two halves. Behind each baseline are the glass walls – you may play the ball off them like a rebound. The long sides are partly mesh fencing. You serve diagonally into the service box, the zone between the service line and the net. It is almost always played as doubles – and because the walls are part of the game, the ball stays in play far longer than in tennis.
The serve
You serve underhand, below waist height. Let the ball bounce once on the floor, then hit it diagonally into the opponent’s service box. You get two attempts. After bouncing, the ball may touch the side wall – but not the mesh fence directly.
Serving order
One player serves for an entire game, switching side after every point – right box, left box, alternating. After the game the serve passes to the other team; within a team the two partners alternate from game to game.
Scoring
Scoring is like tennis: 15, 30, 40, game. The first to four points (with a two-point lead) wins the game. Six games make a set, and matches are usually best-of-3.
Golden Point & tie-break
At 40:40 (deuce) there are two formats: classic advantage (win by two points) or the Golden Point – a single decisive point where the returning team picks the side. At 6:6 in games a tie-break decides the set: first to 7 points (win by two).
The walls
The heart of padel: if the ball bounces on your side of the floor first, it may then rebound off your own walls – and you play it back. That is why balls are retrievable that would be long “out” in tennis. Playing off the walls is allowed and part of the tactics.
Point or fault
A rally ends when the ball bounces twice on the floor, goes into the net, or when someone hits it straight into the opponent’s wall/fence or out of the court without it touching their floor first. The point then goes to the other team.
In short: serve underhand and diagonally, score like in tennis, use the walls – and the ball must always hit the floor first before the wall comes into play.