Pickleball as a game isn’t particularly difficult to pick up as long as you know the rules. 

One of the more challenging parts of acquainting yourself with the game, though, revolves around scoring and where players should position themselves based on the score of the match.

That’s what we’ll focus on in this article.

First Things First: What are we playing to?

Most pickleball games are played to 11, win by 2. This will most likely be the case for every rec play match at your local park or club.

Tournaments, for the most part, will either stick to that format for best two out of three games, although some opt for one game to 15.

In most games, players can score points only when they are serving. This format is called side out scoring, but it can look different depending on whether it’s a singles match or a doubles match.

There is also the rally scoring format, but more on that later. For now, we’ll focus on doubles scoring and singles scoring in a side out scoring format.

Singles Scoring in Pickleball

Singles scoring is pretty straightforward. Like in tennis, the serving player is responsible for calling out the score before the point begins. In matches with a referee, that responsibility falls on them.

The score should be announced in the following sequence: serving player’s score – receiving player’s score.  

The server starts on the right side and switches to the left side every time he or she scores a point on serve. The player serves on the right side with an even score and on the left side with an odd score.

The receiving player lines up diagonally from the server based on the score so that every point begins with a crosscourt serve.

The server and receiver switch roles following this format until one of them reaches 11 points and wins by two.

Doubles Scoring in Pickleball

The score in pickleball doubles has three elements, instead of just the server’s and receiver’s scores.

It also includes either the number one or two to indicate server number.

If the score ends on a 1, then the players know that the other member of the serving team will serve on the next point even if they lose the current point.

With the second server up, players know that a side out will ensue if the serving team loses the point, giving the serve over to the other team.

With this format, both members of each team serve in a given rotation.   

The only exception to this rule occurs at the very beginning of the game. To minimize the advantage that comes with serving first, only one member of the team that starts on serve gets to do so.

This is why the opening score in doubles is always 0-0-2, to signify that only one member of the serving team will serve to start off the match. After the serve switches once, though, it’s back to two servers for each team.

Like in singles, all serves from 0-0-2 come from the right side. The serving team’s players switch sides with each other when they score a point on serve. The receiving team, however, doesn’t switch sides based off the opponent server’s score or position—they only switch sides when they win a point once they get the serve via a side out.

Rally Scoring

Even though side out scoring is by far the most common scoring method in pickleball, rally scoring is another format that was made popular by Major League Pickleball (MLP), although MLP has now moved over to side out scoring. 

Rally scoring does away with the notion of only being able to score points while serving. Instead, each rally ends with one of the teams earning a point, and they play one game to 21.

The exception to this rule is when a team reaches 20 points. At one point away from the victory, the team can only score points (and close out the match) by winning a point on serve.

If the opposing team does not have 20 points, they will still score for every rally they win (when both serving and receiving) until they reach 20 points. Once this happens, scoring reverts back to the traditional side out scoring where points can only be scored on serve until one team wins by two.   

Another difference from side out scoring is that players don’t switch sides when they win a point on serve. Instead, the team alternates who serves each point based on their score.

If the serving team has an even number of points, then the player on the right side of the court serves; if it has an odd number, then the player on the left side serves.

Additionally, there is no guaranteed second server in rally scoring; because teams can get points from every rally, they just serve until they lose, and then it switches to the other team.

Check out this article for an in-depth look at rally scoring.  

So… What Next?

Now that you’ve got the basics of pickleball scoring, it’s time to take to the court.

Check out our other articles for answers to your other pickleball questions, and
Pickleball Central for gear that will get you on the road to pickleball prowess.