How to keep score in badminton

Badminton scoring at a glance

How many points do you need to win a game of badminton?

You need 21 points and a 2-point lead. At 21-15 or 21-19 the game is over. At 20-all, reaching 21 is no longer enough: the game continues until one side leads by 2, so it can finish 22-20, 23-21 and so on.

It cannot go on forever. The cap is 30: at 29-all the next rally wins the game 30-29. The page on 20-all and the 30-point cap walks through every way a close game can end.

How does rally scoring work?

Every rally ends with a point for someone. It does not matter who served: if the receiving side wins the rally, it scores and takes the serve. There is no fixed rotation, so a side keeps serving for as long as it keeps winning rallies.

Three serving rules affect the count:

• One serve only. There is no second serve. A service fault ends the rally and gives the point and the serve to the opponents.
• Lets are replayed. A let, for example when the receiver was not ready, means the rally is played again and the score does not change.
• Service height. The whole shuttle must be below 1.15 m from the court surface when the server hits it.

Before each serve, call the score with the server's score first. A server trailing 10-15 calls "10-15", not "15-10".

How many games are in a badminton match?

A standard match is best of 3 games: the first side to win 2 games wins. If the first two games are split, a third game decides it, played to the same 21 points and 30-point cap. There is no tiebreak game, and there are no sets: a badminton match is counted in games alone.

Every game starts at 0-0, and the winner of the previous game serves first in the next one. A match that goes the distance might finish 21-18, 19-21, 21-17.

How does the score decide the service court?

The service court helper works this out rally by rally, but the rule is short. Your own score decides it. When the serving side's score is even, including 0, the server serves from the right service court. When it is odd, the server serves from the left. The opponents' score makes no difference.

Server and receiver stand in diagonally opposite service courts, and the serve goes across into the receiver's court. In singles that is the whole rule: at 7-4 the server serves from the left, at 8-4 from the right.

How does serving work in doubles?

Doubles uses the same even and odd rule, plus two rules for which partner serves:

1. The serving side wins the rally: it scores, and the same player serves again from the other service court. This is the only time partners swap courts.
2. The receiving side wins the rally: it scores and becomes the serving side, but nobody moves. The partner already standing in the court that matches the new score (right for even, left for odd) serves.

The receiving pair stays where it is, so the receiver is always the player standing diagonally opposite the server.

Worked example: following the serve and service court in doubles

This doubles game starts at 19-all with the Reds serving. Follow the serve as it passes to whichever side wins each rally, and watch who serves from which court: the same player after a point won on their own serve, whichever partner stands in the matching court after the serve is won back. The game also runs past 20-all, so it needs extra points to finish.

Had the game reached 29-all, the next rally would have ended it 30-29. The 30-point cap page shows that finish rally by rally.

When do players change ends and take breaks?

What changes with 3x15 scoring in 2027?

From 4 January 2027, the BWF replaces the 3x21 system with 3x15, and games go to 15 points instead of 21. The rest of this guide still applies until then. 3x15 scoring explained sets out the rest of the new rules side by side with 3x21.