Court, net and sand
The playing court is a 16 × 8 m rectangle, surrounded by a free zone of at least 3 m on all sides and a free space in height of at least 7 m. There is no centre line, and no attack line: the only lines are the four boundary lines, 5-8 cm wide and made of ribbons in a contrasting colour to the sand.
The sand must be at least 40 cm deep, fine, level and free of stones and shells. It is the only safety requirement worth checking before playing: a court with hard sand beneath the first few centimetres is bad for the ankles.
The net is 8,5 m long and 1 m high, with two antennae defining the crossing space, exactly like in indoor volleyball. The official heights are the same as indoor: 2,43 m for men and 2,24 m for women.
Scoring and switching sides
Matches are played to the best of three sets. The first two are won at 21 points with at least a 2-point lead, with no scoring cap: at 20-20, play continues until 22-20, 23-21 and so on. The deciding set is played to 15 points, again with a two-point lead.
Switching sides is the rule that surprises those coming from the indoor hall: it happens every 7 total points in the first two sets (i.e. when the sum of the scores reaches 7, 14, 21...) and every 5 total points in the deciding set. There is no break: teams simply pass under the net and resume. This serves to distribute sun, wind and court conditions equally.
Each team has only one 30-second time-out per set. In international competitions, a technical time-out is added when the sum of the points in the first two sets reaches 21; in an amateur tournament, this is not necessary.
Service order
There are no positions and no rotation: the two players can stand wherever they want on their side of the court. The only thing to respect is the service order, which is established at the start of each set and alternates: if one player has served, the other serves at the team's next service turn.
Watch out for a practical consequence: when you win back the service after an opponent's turn, the player who did not serve last serves. This is the most common mistake in unrefereed matches, and the easiest way to avoid it is to call out the server's name at every side-out.
The server can serve from any point behind the end line, across the entire width of the court, and has 8 seconds from the whistle to do so. The serve cannot be attacked when the ball is entirely higher than the top edge of the net.
Touches: three rules that differ from indoor
- The block counts as a touch. After a touch on the block, two touches remain, not three. The player who blocked can play the ball again, and in 2-on-2 they almost always do.
- The first touch can be double. On a hard-driven ball, the team's first touch can involve multiple contacts or a brief catch, provided the action is a single motion. This applies both to receiving a serve and defending a spike.
- No attacking with open fingers. Completing an attack with an open-hand finger action, or directing the ball with the fingertips, is a fault. The permitted hits instead of the open-hand tip are the knuckles, the open and stiff palm, and a shot hit with the palm or a closed hand.
Everything else remains the same as indoor: three touches per play, ball touching the line is in, ball touching the antenna is out, net touch above the net is only permitted after completing one's hit. Under the net, with no centre line, you can cross into the opponent's court as long as you do not interfere with their play.
Clothing and conduct
Play is barefoot: shoes are only allowed if the referee authorises them due to the sand being too hot or too cold. Caps and sunglasses are permitted. There is no captain on the court with special powers, and in official competitions, coaching during play is limited or forbidden: in beach volleyball, you manage as a pair, and that is part of its charm.
A final note on amateur variations: beach tournaments very often play 3-on-3 or 4-on-4, with or without rotation, and sometimes with the net at an intermediate height. These are perfectly legitimate formats, but they cease to be "official beach volleyball": write down how many touches, how many points, and whether the open-hand tip is allowed, because these are the three points people argue about at the end of a set.