Badminton vocabulary: the words you need to start
135 useful badminton words, grouped by theme (equipment, court, shots, scoring, faults, doubles, training, officials, the Laws, Para badminton, tournaments, techniques, racket and shuttle details, words heard on court), each with a short explanation.
Read one group at a time; you do not need to learn the whole page before playing.
The equipment
- Racket: The implement you hold to hit the shuttle.
- Shuttle: The object sent across the net, made with feathers or a synthetic skirt.
- String bed: The strung area inside the racket head.
- Net: The barrier separating the two sides of the court.
- Grip: The handle of the racket, and also the way you hold it.
- Frame: The head and outline of the racket that holds the strings.
- Shaft: The long part of the racket between the head and the handle.
- String tension: How tightly the strings are pulled when the racket is strung, usually given in pounds or kilograms.
- Synthetic shuttle: A shuttle with a plastic skirt instead of feathers; it lasts longer and is often used for practice.
- Overgrip: A thin wrap added over the handle for comfort and a better hold; it is replaced often.
Finding your way around the court
- Court: The marked playing area, with the net across its middle.
- Sideline: A side boundary: the inner line is used for singles, the outer one for doubles.
- Service court: A marked area used for serving and receiving; its boundaries depend on singles or doubles.
- Footwork: The steps and movements that take you to the shuttle and back to a ready position.
- Back boundary line: The line at the far end of each side of the court; a shuttle landing beyond it is out.
- Centre line: The line that splits each side into a right and a left service court.
- Short service line: The line closest to the net, 1.98 m from it; a serve must land on it or beyond it.
- Long service line: The far limit of the service court: the back boundary line in singles, a line a little inside it in doubles.
- Side alley: The narrow strip between the two sidelines on each side; it counts in doubles but not in singles.
- Forecourt: The area close to the net, where net shots and lifts are played.
- Rear court: The area near the back boundary line, where clears, drops and smashes are usually hit from.
Starting and following play
- Singles: One player on each side.
- Doubles: Two players on each side.
- Serve: The opening stroke of a rally, directed towards the diagonally opposite service court.
- Receiver: The player designated to return the serve.
- Rally: Play from the serve until the shuttle is no longer in play; a rally can end after one stroke.
Recognising the shots
- Clear: A rear-to-rear shot. Its flight can be high or more direct.
- Lift: A shot lifting the shuttle from the front of your court towards the opponent's rear court.
- Drop shot: A shot from your rear court towards the opponent's front court.
- Net shot: A short shot from near the net to near the net on the other side.
- Drive: A fast, relatively flat shot, rather than a high lifting shot.
- Smash: An attacking stroke sending the shuttle sharply downwards.
- Forehand: A stroke played on your racket-hand side, with the palm facing forward.
- Backhand: A stroke played on the side opposite your racket hand, with the back of the hand towards the target.
- Half smash: A smash hit with less power so it drops steeply; it is easier to control.
- Push: A gentle, flat shot pushed forward from the net or midcourt, usually into the space beside or behind the opponent.
- Kill: A quick downward shot played from above the net to finish the rally.
- Cross-court shot: A shot sent diagonally to the opposite corner of the other side.
- Block: A soft reply to a hard shot: you hold the racket firm and let the shuttle rebound over the net.
- Overhead shot: Any shot hit above the head, such as a clear, a drop or a smash.
- Round-the-head shot: An overhead shot played with the forehand on the backhand side, so you avoid a weak backhand.
Score and rules
- Point: What a side wins when it wins a rally.
- Game: A set of points played until one side reaches the target set by the Laws of Badminton.
- Umpire: The official in charge of a match, who applies the Laws and calls the score.
- Fault: A breach of the Laws, for example serving incorrectly, which gives the point to the other side.
- Rally-point scoring: Every rally gives a point to the side that wins it, whoever served.
- Match: A complete contest between two players or pairs, made of several games.
- Interval: A short break inside a game and between games, with a time set by the rules.
- Game point: The moment when one side needs just one more point to win the game.
- Match point: The moment when one side needs just one more point to win the whole match.
- Deuce: A tie at 20-all: play goes on until one side leads by two points; at 29-all, the side that scores the 30th point wins.
Faults and unusual situations
- Service fault: A serve that breaks the rules, for example one hit from too high or with the feet moving.
- Foot fault: A serving or receiving player who steps on a line or lifts a foot before the serve is hit.
- Let: A replay of the rally, called when something unforeseen happens, such as a shuttle from another court.
- Double hit: A fault: the shuttle is hit twice in a row by the same player, or by both partners.
- Touching the net: A fault: the racket, body or clothes touch the net or its posts while the shuttle is in play.
- Hitting over the net: A fault: hitting the shuttle before it has crossed the net. Following through over the net after a legal hit is allowed.
- Out: A shuttle that lands outside the lines. One that touches a line is in.
Playing doubles
- Mixed doubles: Doubles where each pair has one woman and one man.
- Front and back: A doubles position with one partner near the net and the other behind, usually when attacking.
- Side by side: A doubles position with the partners standing next to each other, each covering one half of the court, usually when defending.
- Rotation: Partners swapping places smoothly as the rally changes from defence to attack and back.
- Intercept: Stepping in to hit a shuttle that was meant for your partner or the space between you.
Training
- Warm-up: Light exercise before playing that prepares the body and raises the heart rate gradually.
- Cool-down: Easy movement and stretching after play to let the body settle.
- Drill: A repeated pattern of shots or movements with a clear aim, practised alone or with a partner.
- Multi-shuttle practice: A drill where a feeder sends many shuttles one after another so the player can repeat a shot without stopping.
- Split step: A small hop timed just as the opponent hits, so you can push off quickly in any direction.
- Lunge: A long final step toward the shuttle, mostly used to reach shots at the net.
The officials
- Referee: The official in charge of the whole tournament, whom players can ask for a decision when the umpire cannot settle it.
- Service judge: An official who watches only whether serves follow the rules.
- Line judge: An official who watches the lines and signals whether the shuttle landed in or out.
- Challenge: A request to check a line call on video, where the event uses a review system; each side has a limited number.
- Card: A warning shown by the umpire for misconduct, such as delaying play; stronger cards mean penalties.
The Laws and official terms
- Toss: Done before play: the winner chooses either to serve or receive first, or the end of the court; the loser takes the remaining choice.
- Change of ends: Players swap sides of the net: after the first game, after the second if there is a third, and in the third game when a side first reaches 11 points.
- Serving side: The side that has the right to serve.
- Receiving side: The side opposing the serving side.
- Stroke: In the Laws, a movement of the player's racket made with the intention to hit the shuttle.
- Shuttle not in play: The shuttle is not in play when it strikes the net or post and starts to fall on the striker's side, when it hits the court surface, or when a fault or a let has occurred.
- Service court error: Serving or receiving out of turn, or from the wrong service court. It is corrected when the shuttle is not in play and the existing score stands.
- Undue delay: A delay in delivering the serve once server and receiver are ready; it is a service fault.
- Suspension of play: A pause ordered by the umpire for reasons beyond the players' control, or by the referee in special circumstances; the score stands and play resumes from that point.
- Advice: Coaching words to a player: allowed only when the shuttle is not in play, and until the players have taken position to serve and receive.
- Misconduct: Offensive or inappropriate behaviour, or any conduct not covered elsewhere in the Laws; the umpire answers with a warning or a fault.
- Warning: The first step the umpire takes against a side that breaks the rules on continuous play or conduct; a later breach is a fault.
- Disqualification: Removal of a side from the match; the referee has the power to decide it after the umpire has faulted and reported the side.
- Unsighted: When an official could not see the action. The umpire then does that official's job or plays a let.
- Technical delegate: A technical official of a tournament. The Laws name the role only in the Para badminton clause about exceptions to the feet rule.
- Instant review system: An electronic system that, where used, decides challenges to line calls.
Para badminton
- Para badminton: Badminton played by athletes with an impairment, under the Laws with added clauses for wheelchair and standing classes.
- Wheelchair Badminton: The Para badminton classes played from a wheelchair, on the courts of Diagrams D and E of the Laws.
- Standing classes: The Para badminton classes played standing. Most use the standard court; those playing half-court use the court of Diagram F.
- Half-court: The reduced singles court of Diagram F, used by standing classes such as SL 3.
- Classification: The process that places Para athletes in sport classes according to how their impairment affects the sport. The Laws do not describe it.
- Head of Classification: The official who provides the list of players medically justified for exceptions to the feet rule in Para badminton.
- Footrest: The part of the wheelchair on which the player's feet must be fixed; losing the fixation is a fault.
- Counter-movement: The natural movement of the server's wheelchair that is tolerated while the wheels must otherwise stay stationary during service.
Tournaments and rankings
- Seed: A player placed in the draw by earlier results so that the best players do not meet in the early rounds.
- Draw: The arrangement that decides who plays whom in a competition.
- Bye: A place in a knock-out round given without playing, used when the number of entries is not a power of two.
- Knock-out: A format in which the loser of each match is out of the competition.
- Round-robin: A format in which every player or team plays every other one; with n players there are n × (n − 1) ÷ 2 matches.
- Ladder: A club format in which ranked players may challenge the player just above and swap places if they win.
- Walkover: A win given to a player whose opponent does not play the match.
- Retirement: A player stops during the match, for example through injury, and the opponent wins.
- Best of three games: The usual match length in the Laws: the first side to win two games wins the match, unless arranged otherwise.
- World ranking: A list that orders players by points won in tournaments.
- Thomas Cup: The world men's team championship of badminton.
- Uber Cup: The world women's team championship of badminton.
- Sudirman Cup: The world mixed team championship of badminton.
More shots and techniques
- Flick serve: A serve that looks like a short serve, then ends with a quick wrist snap that sends the shuttle high to the back of the court.
- Backhand serve: A serve hit on the backhand side, common in doubles for short, low serves.
- Short serve: A serve that crosses the net low and lands near the short service line.
- Tumbling net shot: A net shot in which the shuttle turns over as it crosses the tape, which makes it harder to read.
- Hairpin net shot: A net shot lifted from just under the tape that rises, passes over and drops straight down, with a path shaped like a hairpin.
- Slice: A shot where the racket brushes across the shuttle to change its direction or speed, often to disguise the stroke.
- Jump smash: A smash hit after leaving the floor, which adds height, angle and power.
- Stick smash: A compact smash with a short swing and a quick wrist and finger action, hard to prepare for.
- Attacking clear: A flatter, faster clear that reaches the back of the court sooner and gives the opponent less time.
- Defensive clear: A high, deep clear that gives you time to recover your position.
- Deception: Hiding which shot you are about to play, or changing it at the last moment, to mislead the opponent.
The racket and shuttle in detail
- Base: The rounded part of the shuttle that the racket first hits on a serve; the Laws give it a diameter of 25 to 28 mm.
- Skirt: The part of a synthetic shuttle that replaces the feathers.
- Feathered shuttle: A shuttle with 16 feathers fixed in a cork base covered with leather, weighing 4.74 to 5.50 g under the Laws.
- Head: The part of the racket that bounds the stringed area.
- Throat: The part, if the racket has one, that joins the shaft to the head.
- Balance point: The point where the racket balances; a head-heavy racket has it toward the head, which changes how it feels.
- Shaft stiffness: How much the shaft bends when you swing; a more flexible shaft bends more.
- String gauge: The thickness of the string; some players choose thinner strings for feel.
- Wrist cord: A cord that secures the handle to the player's hand, one of the few things the Laws allow to be attached to a racket.
Words you hear on court
- Love: Zero in the score call; "love all" means 0–0.
- Net cord: A shuttle that clips the top of the net and still goes over; it stays in play, but one that fails to pass over the net is a fault.
- Line call: The decision on whether the shuttle landed in or out on a line, made by a line judge or the players.
- Winner: A shot the opponent cannot return, which wins the rally.
A name is a clue, not a technique lesson. In clubs, “lob” may be used for a lift, and “drop” for different short shots. Ask where the shot starts and where it should go.
General practice advice: play within your limits and stop if something hurts.