Squash Court Dimensions
Official WSF squash court measurements — wall heights, tin line, service box, and marking layout
Squash Court Dimensions
Official WSF squash court measurements — wall heights, tin line, service box, and marking layout
What are the Official Squash Court Dimensions?
A standard squash court is a precisely defined enclosed space measuring 9.75 metres long and 6.40 metres wide, governed by the World Squash Federation (WSF). Unlike most racket sports, squash is played against a shared front wall rather than over a net, meaning all four walls and the ceiling are in play (with boundaries). The front wall is the main playing surface: it is 4.57 metres high at its upper boundary (the out line) and 0.48 metres high at its lower boundary (the tin, or tell-tale). The service line on the front wall sits at 1.83 metres.
The floor is divided by a short line running across the full width at 5.49 metres from the front wall. This divides the court into the front court and back court. Behind the short line, the back corners contain two service boxes — each a square of approximately 1.60m × 1.60m. A serve must be struck from inside a service box and must reach the front wall between the tin and service line, landing in the back half of the opponent's side. The back wall has a minimum height of 2.13 metres.
Squash court glass walls for spectators are now standard at professional level, with fully glass showcase courts used for major events. Glass courts provide 360-degree visibility and spectacular viewing angles. The World Squash Federation and Professional Squash Association maintain identical court specifications regardless of wall material — all dimensions and line positions remain the same on glass, plaster, and composite courts. Squash has a strong competitive tradition in India, with PSA-rated professional tournaments held regularly.
How to Use This Calculator
Wall Line Heights — Front Wall
- • 4.57 m: Out line — ball above here is out of play
- • 1.83 m: Service line — serve must land above this
- • 0.48 m: Tin (tell-tale) — ball hitting this is out (like a net)
- • 2.13 m: Back wall minimum height
Why Playing All Four Walls Makes Squash Uniquely Demanding
Squash is one of the only major racket sports where the boundaries aren't just lines on a floor but three-dimensional zones on every wall — the tin, the out line, and the side and back walls all constrain a shot simultaneously, which is why a single mis-hit can be out for several different reasons at once (too low into the tin, too high past the out line, or wide past a side wall). That layered set of boundaries is what makes squash shot-making so much more error-prone under pressure than a sport with a single flat boundary.
The tin specifically exists because, without it, players could simply skim the ball along the floor indefinitely with no meaningful barrier to clear, so the front wall's lower line does the same job a net does in other racket sports — just mounted vertically on a wall instead of stretched across a court.
?Frequently Asked Questions
The tin (also called the tell-tale or board) is the metal strip at the bottom of the front wall, 0.48 metres high. Any ball that hits the tin makes a distinct ringing noise and is immediately out of play — equivalent to hitting the net in tennis. The tin serves two purposes: it makes ball contact clearly audible so players know instantly when a shot is out, and it defines the minimum height a ball must travel to be valid. Without the tin, players could scrape shots along the floor almost indefinitely, making the game unplayable.
Squash and racquetball courts look similar but have different dimensions and rules. A squash court is 9.75m × 6.40m with a front wall out line at 4.57m. A racquetball court is typically 12.19m × 6.10m (40ft × 20ft) with no tin — the entire front wall is playable including the floor. Racquetball uses a larger hollow rubber ball and allows ceiling shots. The two sports use completely different rackets and balls and are governed by separate international federations.
Modern professional squash uses PAR (Point-A-Rally) scoring to 11 points — a point is scored on every rally regardless of who served. Matches are typically best-of-five games. Each game goes to 11, with a 2-point lead required above 10-all (so 12–10, 13–11 etc.). Traditional scoring was 9-point hand-in / hand-out, where only the server could score a point — this system is still used at some amateur levels and was the standard until the early 2000s. The PSA World Tour moved to PAR-11 to speed up matches for television.
India has produced several world-class squash players, most notably Saurav Ghosal who reached a career-high world ranking of 10, becoming the highest-ranked Indian squash player ever. The Squash Rackets Federation of India (SRFI) runs national and state-level circuits. Chennai, Kolkata, and Delhi have strong squash clubs with WSF-standard courts. The sport has grown significantly since the early 2000s and Indian players regularly compete on the PSA World Tour.
Each back corner of the court has a service box, roughly 1.60m × 1.60m. A server must have at least one foot inside a service box when striking the serve, and which box they serve from alternates depending on the score — serving from the right box after winning a point with an even score, from the left after an odd one. The receiver stands in the diagonally opposite back quarter to return the serve once it passes the short line.
The front wall is the only wall every shot must eventually strike, so it's the one surface where "too high" (out line) and "too low" (tin) actually need marking — the side and back walls can be used freely for angled shots at any height, since a rebound off them still has to reach the front wall to count. That's why the out line, service line, and tin all live exclusively on the front wall in the diagram, not the side or back walls.
Squash balls are small, hollow rubber balls rated by a coloured dot indicating bounce speed — double yellow (the slowest, least bouncy, used in professional and advanced play), yellow, red, blue, and orange (fastest/bounciest, for beginners). A cold ball barely bounces at all, which is why professional matches often start slowly while players warm the ball up through play; the low-bounce double-yellow ball is part of why elite squash rallies are so much more athletic than casual games with a livelier ball.