How Much Room Is Needed For A Ping-Pong Table?

Leisure is fun, keeps you hearty and saves you some medical bills through the numerous health benefits it offers. Having a table tennis table in the comfort of your home is good for recreation, and you don't have to be outdoors all the time just to sweat it out and pump blood faster around your body when you can have the means right there in your home.

The big question which might end up being so minute after clarification is how much room is needed for a Ping-Pong table in your home?

If you really want to have the recreation experience derived from volleying tennis ball around in your home, then you must create ample space for it. The prime factor involved here which is the amount of room needed to house a Ping-Pong is dependent on the size of your property. It could have been a lot easier if we were talking about having the Ping-Pong outdoors which we aren’t totally ruling out here.

It's still considerable and ideal, for instance, the fresh air outside and around your lawn, as dusk approaches is really great for recreation with family and friends, but when the sun is blazing hot, or the clouds are spitting out torrents of water, and you need to stay warm, you have to be indoors.

So the volume of space you'll require is a factor anchored on the size of your house. The standard dimensions of an ideal table tennis table are 9ft by 5ft. With this in mind, you can visualize the amount of ample space or room needed for it.

There's also another factor to be considered here. Are you having it around the home for leisure with family or you intend using to compete with friends after earning bragging rights at the tennis club?

If the first scenario is what you have in mind, then you might not sacrifice the bulk of your living space for it. It's for fun and exercise. You want your kids to learn how to play, you want to have fun with your wife by letting her win playfully. It's not something really serious and worth feeling like a defeated loser.

So you'll be looking at a room with a 22ft by 11ft dimensions. It's quite on the high side. Yes, you will need that much space for byline ego boosting shots, and since it's for training and fun, it won't be fun anymore when you start slamming your body against the walls in an attempt to take crucial shots that will determine your victory. Equally, your kids need to learn with enough space to practice kick-ass skills.

You need the bulk of overlap between the Ping-Pong table and the walls of the room on both sides (Length and breadth). You can only go below this standard and settle for 18ft by 10ft if you only want for your kids or you intend taking chances with injuries.

The second factor has to do with your competitive intentions and probably the bid to retain the credibility you've earned as a crackerjack tennis player around town. In this case, you'll need to go by the general standards obtainable and play by all the rules in the book. This means you'll be gulping a much bigger space in your mini real estate than normal.

Going by the standards set by the International Tennis Federation (ITF), a Ping-Pong table should be 9ft long and 5ft wide. The room or space housing the table should be rectangular in shape, 14 meters long, 7 meters wide and 5 meters high. Also, as ample as the space required can be, it should have proper ventilation so air and light can be permeable. It should also be enclosed to avoid the balls wandering far away.

With this in mind, you are looking at creating a whopping 45ft plus space out of your house which can be bigger than it actually sounds. The reason for this is an easy guess. It’s a competition and skills will be deployed by participants. These skills will most times cause them to maintain a certain level of space between their bodies and the tennis board. Byline shots will be more frequent, body movements will be more rapid and energetic. You need all the space you can afford if you are going serious with this, else make do with your family idea of recreation by playing with your kids or teaching them.

With the knowledge of the spacious implication, you can now decide if you want to play table tennis at home for leisure or for other purposes.

Anna Carter is a freelance writer and table tennis addict. She lives in NY City.