Packing your next court
Packing your next court
Tell it how many courts, players, and hours you have. It works out how many games each player gets, how long they'll sit between games, and whether you booked the right number of courts.
No guesswork — it's the same arithmetic a good host does in their head, only faster.
Each doubles court seats 4 players (singles seats 2). Courts you can't fill sit empty, so the calculator only counts the ones your group can actually use.
Session minutes divided by your average game gives the rounds each court gets through. A game to 11 plus changeover is about 15 minutes — change it if your group plays faster.
Total seats across all rounds, divided by your headcount, is the games each player can expect. Anyone over the seat count waits, which is where the sit-out estimate comes from.
Typical 2-hour session, 15-minute games, doubles.
| Players | Courts | Games each | Waiting per round |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | 2 | 8 | 0 |
| 10 | 2 | 6.4 | 2 |
| 12 | 2 | 5.3 | 4 |
| 12 | 3 | 8 | 0 |
| 16 | 3 | 6 | 4 |
| 20 | 4 | 6.4 | 4 |
The questions hosts ask before booking a court.
A doubles game to 11 with the changeover runs about 15 minutes, so one court gets through roughly four games an hour. Rally scoring to 11 is closer to 12 minutes, and games to 15 usually take 20.
Four for doubles, two for singles. For open play most groups run 6 to 8 players per court — enough to keep a rotation fresh without long waits. Past 8 per court the bench gets longer than the game.
Divide your player count by four for doubles. Twelve players fill three courts with nobody waiting; on two courts, four players sit out every round. The calculator shows both numbers for your exact group.
Work back from games per player. Set your courts, players, and target games in the calculator and it returns the booking length you need — most social sessions land between 90 minutes and 2 hours.
Yes. It is free, needs no account, and runs entirely in your browser. You can share a link that opens with your exact numbers already filled in.