Official Table Tennis Rules

While the game of table tennis or ping pong can be played casually and can follow whatever scoring pattern you and your opponent may agree upon, there are official table tennis rules that have to be followed when it comes to official games or tournaments. These official table tennis rules cover all the aspects of the game so as to avoid any protests and contentions to the goings on when the game is in progress. The list of official ping pong rules for certain local and small time tournaments may vary from the official rules of table tennis when it comes to international association sanctioned games or even for the Olympics.

Some of the common yet official rules table tennis clubs and competitions follow is the alternation in serving and the scoring. Although the rules for choosing which player gets to start the match may vary from one tournament to the other, the official table tennis rule for scoring basically remains the same. The person who misses a ball essentially gives out a point to an opponent, whether or not the losing side served. There are also points that can be awarded to the opposing side for certain game violations, like placing a hand on the playing surface or moving the table in any way.

One official ping pong rule that is also common to all the official ping pong tournaments that happen everywhere in the world is the let rule. This rule used to state that when a person executes a let, or when a person serves and the ball hits the net but still successfully passes over to the other side of the table, he has to serve the ball again and is allowed only three lets for his serve. Nowadays, the let rule states that the server can commit any number of lets until he or she successfully gets the ball over to the other side of the table.

You can read up on the numerous table tennis official rules from the various national and international entities that support and promote the game. The international governing body of the sport, which is the ITTF or the International Table Tennis Federation, look at these official table tennis rules from time to time to ascertain if revisions should be made to them. You can find ping pong official rules or official rules for table tennis from this organization's site. You can also type “free official ping pong rules” to get yourself copies from other sites as well.