The Badminton Knock-Up: What to Hit Before the First Serve

Last checked: August 2026 · Written by the Badminton House player-led team.

A knock-up is the cooperative hitting immediately before a match. It is not a replacement for raising your temperature, moving through useful ranges and building speed before you reach the court. Arrive physically ready; use the shuttle time to learn how your contact and the hall feel today.

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How long is the badminton knock-up?

Prepare to get useful information quickly. In a current officiated BWF match, the full on-court warm-up interval is two minutes, but “Ready to play” is called at 90 seconds unless the referee instructs otherwise. Stop hitting then and use the final 30 seconds for readiness and announcements. A local league, club or unsupervised event may use a different arrangement, so check the event instructions instead of assuming every tournament follows the same clock.

The current BWF Instructions to Technical Officials define that sequence: “Ready to play” at 90 seconds and “Play” at two minutes, unless the referee directs otherwise. Badminton England’s tournament regulations likewise state that knocking up must not exceed two minutes.

Neither document prescribes the shot order below. This is a Badminton House routine designed to stop the clock being consumed by aimless clears. When an umpire or organizer gives different instructions, those instructions control.

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What is a useful two-minute badminton knock-up sequence?

Move briskly through five checks: rear-court length, flat timing, front-court touch, event-specific movement, then serve and return. Keep the exchanges cooperative. The point is to give both sides predictable contact—not to win a rally, hide the shuttle or test an opponent with surprise shots.

If the clear exchange runs long, cut it rather than deleting serve and return. The first rally begins with those two contacts, and they are the only shots you can predict with certainty.

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Should singles and doubles players knock up differently?

Yes: keep the core contacts, then weight the final part toward the event. Singles preparation needs whole-court movement and length. Doubles needs more body-height hitting and serve-return work. That does not require a competitive rally; it requires choosing exchanges that resemble the first decisions you will make.

The BWF Level 1 coaching manual describes knock-up as one part of a broader warm-up and says it should include strokes and movements relevant to the event. Its singles example covers the whole court; its doubles guidance emphasizes body hitting and serve-return situations.

For the match decisions that follow, use the doubles first-three-shots guide or the singles serve-return plan. Keep those tactical choices out of the cooperative knock-up.

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What if your club gives you five minutes?

Use the extra time to repeat information, not to add every shot you know. Run roughly one minute of clears, one minute of drives, one minute of drop-net-lift, one minute of event-specific movement and one minute of serves and returns. Change ends or sides if the hall has obvious drift, glare or background differences.

• Clear short? Check contact and effort on two more cooperative shuttles before deciding the hall is slow.
• Net touch running long? Shorten the swing and observe the shuttle rather than forcing a spinning winner.
• Floor feels uncertain? Use controlled movement; a knock-up is not the place to test an all-out lunge.
• Serve timing off? Rehearse the same pre-serve routine you will use at 0–0.

Do not interpret a few cooperative shots as a scouting report. Your opponent may be protecting an injury, conserving effort or simply feeding you easy contacts. The useful observations are about your timing, the shuttle, the floor and the sightline.

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Which knock-up mistakes waste the window?

The common failures are arriving cold, clearing for the entire clock, turning cooperation into a rally and forgetting the serve. Each one confuses the purpose of the window. You need a small number of clean contacts across the situations that will appear first—not fatigue, deception or a psychological win.