The short answer
A regulation pickleball court is 20 by 44 ft (6.10 by 13.41 m), the same for singles and doubles. A tennis court is 27 by 78 ft (8.23 by 23.77 m) for singles, widening to 36 ft (10.97 m) for doubles.
By area, a pickleball court covers 880 sq ft (81.8 m²) against 2,808 sq ft (260.9 m²) for a doubles tennis court. Pickleball uses under a third of the space, which is the single fact behind its growth: a club can fit four pickleball courts and sixteen players into the footprint that previously held four tennis players.
Pickleball court dimensions
Every line on a pickleball court, per the USA Pickleball rulebook:
| Element | Imperial | Metric |
|---|---|---|
| Court length | 44 ft | 13.41 m |
| Court width | 20 ft | 6.10 m |
| Playing area | 880 sq ft | 81.8 m² |
| Non-volley zone depth (each side) | 7 ft | 2.13 m |
| Service court (each of four) | 10 by 15 ft | 3.05 by 4.57 m |
| Net height at sidelines | 36 in | 91.44 cm |
| Net height at center | 34 in | 86.36 cm |
| Line width | 2 in | 5.1 cm |
| Minimum total surface | 30 by 60 ft | 9.14 by 18.29 m |
| Recommended total surface | 34 by 64 ft | 10.36 by 19.51 m |
| Tournament total surface | 40 by 64 ft | 12.19 by 19.51 m |
Two of these numbers matter more than the rest. The 7 ft (2.13 m) non-volley zone, universally called the kitchen, is the rule that defines the sport. You cannot volley a ball while standing in it, or while your momentum carries you into it after the volley. Since the zone runs the full width and reaches 7 ft back, it removes the smash-from-the-net game that dominates tennis doubles and forces the dink rally that makes pickleball watchable at recreational level.
The total surface figure is the one that trips up people building a home court. The 20 by 44 ft playing area needs surrounding run-out space. The minimum 30 by 60 ft (18.28 m is 60 ft almost exactly) leaves only 5 ft behind each baseline, which is tight. The recommended 34 by 64 ft gives 10 ft behind the baseline, enough for a genuine baseline drive. Tournament play wants 40 ft of width so that two adjacent courts do not share retrieval space.
Note that unlike tennis, pickleball does not widen for doubles. Singles and doubles use identical lines, and this is why singles pickleball is a brutally demanding game: one player covers the same 880 sq ft that two players share in doubles.
Tennis court dimensions
Tennis, governed by the ITF Rules of Tennis, uses a court that changes width by format:
| Element | Imperial | Metric |
|---|---|---|
| Court length | 78 ft | 23.77 m |
| Singles width | 27 ft | 8.23 m |
| Doubles width | 36 ft | 10.97 m |
| Doubles alley width (each side) | 4.5 ft | 1.37 m |
| Singles playing area | 2,106 sq ft | 195.6 m² |
| Doubles playing area | 2,808 sq ft | 260.9 m² |
| Service line distance from net | 21 ft | 6.40 m |
| Service box | 21 by 13.5 ft | 6.40 by 4.11 m |
| Net height at posts | 3 ft 6 in | 1.07 m |
| Net height at center | 3 ft | 91.44 cm |
| Recommended total enclosure | 60 by 120 ft | 18.29 by 36.58 m |
The service line sits 6.40 m from the net, which is the distance that shapes the entire serve-and-volley calculus. The doubles alleys, 4.5 ft on each side, are the only lines that change between formats. The net posts stand 3 ft outside the doubles sideline.
The recommended enclosure of 60 by 120 ft is why tennis courts consume so much land. The court itself is 2,808 sq ft, but the fenced area is 7,200 sq ft, over two and a half times larger. Baseline run-back of 21 ft is a hard requirement for serious play, because a deep return has to be taken well behind the baseline.
Putting the two on the same scale
| Metric | Pickleball | Tennis (doubles) | Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Length | 44 ft (13.41 m) | 78 ft (23.77 m) | 56% |
| Width | 20 ft (6.10 m) | 36 ft (10.97 m) | 56% |
| Area | 880 sq ft (81.8 m²) | 2,808 sq ft (260.9 m²) | 31% |
| Area per player (doubles) | 220 sq ft | 702 sq ft | 31% |
| Net height at center | 34 in (86.4 cm) | 36 in (91.4 cm) | 94% |
| Distance baseline to net | 22 ft (6.71 m) | 39 ft (11.89 m) | 56% |
The court is scaled to roughly 56 percent in each linear dimension, which squares to 31 percent of the area. That is the geometry, but the playing experience diverges more than the ratio suggests because the net does not scale with it. A pickleball net at 86.4 cm in the center is 94 percent of a tennis net’s center height on a court barely half as long. Relative to court length the pickleball net is effectively much taller, which is exactly why the ball cannot be driven flat from the baseline and why the game gravitates to the soft dink.
Ball and implement specs complete the picture:
| Spec | Pickleball | Tennis |
|---|---|---|
| Ball diameter | 2.87 to 2.97 in (7.29 to 7.54 cm) | 2.57 to 2.70 in (6.54 to 6.86 cm) |
| Ball weight | 0.78 to 0.935 oz (22 to 26.5 g) | 1.975 to 2.095 oz (56 to 59.4 g) |
| Implement max length | 17 in paddle (43.2 cm) | 29 in racket (73.7 cm) |
| Typical top serve speed | 45 mph (72 km/h) | 130 mph (209 km/h) |
A pickleball is larger, lighter, and perforated, so it decelerates fast. Combine that with a paddle 12 inches shorter than a tennis racket and the ball simply cannot be hit hard enough to need a full-size court.
Converting a tennis court to pickleball
The standard conversion fits four pickleball courts on one tennis court, laid crosswise in two pairs. Each pickleball court needs 30 by 60 ft of surface at minimum, and a 60 by 120 ft tennis enclosure divides cleanly into four 30 by 60 ft quadrants.
Three approaches, in order of cost:
- Temporary overlay. Portable nets and taped lines over the existing tennis surface. Costs a few hundred dollars, takes an hour to set up, and leaves the tennis court fully usable. The compromise is that the tennis lines remain visible and cause line-call confusion.
- Blended lines. Permanent pickleball lines painted in a contrasting color over a live tennis court, with sleeves set in the surface for pickleball net posts. This is the common club solution. The USTA publishes a standard blended-line layout so that both sports can be played on the same surface.
- Full conversion. Resurface, remove the tennis lines, install permanent posts and fencing dividers. Four dedicated courts, no compromise, and no tennis.
A single pickleball court can also be improvised on a tennis court without any new markings: the tennis service line sits 21 ft from the net against pickleball’s 22 ft baseline, so playing to the service lines gives a court within a foot of regulation length. It is close enough for casual play and noticeably wrong for anyone with a competitive dink game.
For anyone building a court from scratch, the surface footprint is the number that governs the site plan. A four-court pickleball complex needs roughly 18.28 m by 36.6 m of paved area, about the same as one tennis court, and slightly more than a third of a 50 m competition pool deck. Our guides on basketball court dimensions and soccer pitch versus American football field cover the same footprint question for other sports, and the meters-to-feet calculator handles any dimension in this article that you need in the other system.
Sources and further reading: