How high up can the ball be tossed on a volley serve?
There’s no rule on height of tossing when you’re hitting the serve without allowing the ball to bounce. (That’s a Drop Serve.) So long as you make CONTACT below the belly button, and with the head of the paddle below the wrist.
(Don’t watch the Pros on this. (a) They have different serving rules, and (b) They break the rules a BUNCH … and get called for the violation only rarely.)
- Dink
The volley serve rule doesn’t address propelling the ball up or down, so it’s fair to conclude you can toss the ball up. However, the rule further states that nothing in the volley serve rule applies to the “drop serve” rule. The drop serve rule disallows propelling the ball up or down. The drop serve rule doesn’t say anything about not applying to the volley serve.
The general serving rules disallow imparting spin on the ball during the “toss”, implying the toss can be up or down. (However, it’s hard to imagine propelling the ball down during a volley serve.) It’s equally difficult to toss the ball up without imparting some rotation (spin) on the ball. The no spin rule doesn’t limit how high you can toss the ball. The no spin rule doesn’t define or quantify the allowable amount of spin. It states “no” spin. How high can one toss the ball up without imparting some spin on it.
It stands to reason that disallowing propelling the ball in any direction on a drop serve would also apply to a volley serve because the rule doesn’t limit it to just the drop serve, as the volley serve rule does. By definition the only difference between a volley serve and drop serve is the ball has to bounce on a drop serve.
The rules are ambiguous. Hopefully they will clean this up in the 2025 revisions.
Thanks for responding.