Serve Rotation (Doubles)

In doubles, a serving team does not lose the serve after a single fault. The first partner serves from the right court when their team's score is even and the left court when it is odd, switching courts with their partner every time the team scores. When that server's team commits a fault, the serve does not automatically go to the other team — it first passes to the partner, who becomes the second server and continues serving from wherever the team's score now places them. Only when the second server also faults does the serve pass to the opposing team, an event called a side out.

One exception trips up almost every new doubles player: at the very start of the game, the first serving team only gets one server before the serve passes to the opponents, instead of the usual two. This is because, logically, at 0-0 neither partner has "already served" yet, so the rotation restarts fresh with the returning team once the first fault happens.

Score is called as three numbers in doubles — the serving team's score, the receiving team's score, and the server number (1 or 2) — precisely because the rotation depends on which partner is currently serving. Losing track of the server number is the single most common doubles scoring dispute among newer teams.