Doubles Tennis Rules

The rules for playing doubles in tennis are quite similar to singles tennis rules. The server still starts serving from right to left and then alternates after every point. You still have to serve the ball in the same service box as when you are playing singles. The scoring system is the same. Now let’s list what does change. For starters, you have four players on the court instead of two. Since there are more players on the court, you also get more ground to play with. That’s what those two aisles on each side of the court running down are for.

You are now using all the outside lines but remember the service boxes do not change. Now that we know what the doubles tennis lines are, let’s talk about gameplay. We are going to use two teams as an example. The first team will be called ODD and the players will be P1 and P3. The second will be called EVEN and the players will be P2 and P4. Just like in singles, we flip a coin to decide who is going to serve first: ODD or EVEN.  Let’s say ODD wins. It’s up to P1 and P3 to decide which one of them wants to serve first. It doesn’t matter who does.

On the other team, teams EVEN, P2, and P4 have to decide on which side each player is going to return to. They agree to have P2 return on the right side and P4 on the left. They must remain in that setting for at least the entire set. So P1 decides he’ll serve first. The very first point of the first game then starts with P1 serving the ball to P2. Once that first game is over, it’s now P2’s turn to serve because he’s returning on the right side (first) for that set.

Now is when the ODD team decides who is going to return on the right or left side. They got to serve first and P1 decided to go first but that does not mean he has to return serve on the right side. Whatever they decide though, they will have to stick with it for the rest of the set.

After P2 has served it will be P3’s turn then P4’s. The first set is now over, and team ODD served last. Team EVEN will start serving in the second set. Either P2 or P4 can start serving in the second set, regardless of whether you served last on that team because it’s a new set.

Team ODD can switch up who returns on which side if they want to. Whatever they do they will remain that way for the rest of the set. When Team EVEN returns for the first time in the new set, they can’t switch things up as well as long as they stay that way the entire set. Those are the doubles tennis rules, simple enough.