Tennis - How Scoring in Tennis Works

A tennis match is made up of sets. A set is a number of games, typically six, that are played for points. Points are won by serving and hitting the ball to the opposite side of the net in a matter that it cannot be returned by the opponent (without hitting the ball out of bounds). Each game is served by one player throughout. The first player to have at least four points in a game, and two more than their opponent, is declared the winner.

The three scores leading up to the winning point are love (zero), fifteen, thirty, and forty. The server’s score is always stated first. For example, if the server has scored three points and his or her opponent has not scored, it is stated as “forty-love”. If each player has scored three points, the score is described as “deuce” rather than “forty-all”, and the same is true if the score is tied at any point beyond this. The player winning the first point after the deuce has the advantage; if that player loses the next point, the score is once again deuce. However, if a player with the advantage wins the next point, he or she has won the game.

A set is a collection of games, where the players switch back and forth as servers and swap ends of the court at the end of each odd-numbered game. The first player to have won at least six games, and be two games ahead of his or her opponent is awarded the “match”. If each player has won six games, a tiebreaker is played, and the set is won by the single game.

A match consists usually of an odd number of sets, with the winner designated as the player who wins more than half of the sets. In other words, if a match consists of three sets, the first player to win two sets, regardless of whether all three sets are played, is the winner of the match.

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