Plan a sports court: basketball, tennis, pickleball, volleyball, badminton, squash and hockey

Step by step

1. 1

   Find the court: search in your own words

   Type the sport into Search Furniture & Fixtures: basketball, tennis, pickleball, volleyball, badminton, squash, hockey or rink. The courts are in the Sports & Venues section, next to the bleachers. Search understands words from all nine of the app's languages, whatever language the app is set to, plus common spellings: cancha (as in the screenshot, with the app in English), baloncesto, básquet, terrain de basket, Basketballfeld, quadra or バスケ find the courts too. Cancha de tenis or pista de hielo narrow it to one sport.

   What's there:

   Item	Lines	Surface it comes with
   Basketball Court, Full (94 × 50 ft)	NBA, full court	100 × 56 ft hardwood
   Basketball Court FIBA (28 × 15 m)	FIBA, full court	32 × 19 m hardwood
   High School Basketball Court (84 × 50 ft)	high school, full court	90 × 56 ft hardwood
   Half Basketball Court (50 × 47 ft)	NBA, half court	50 × 50 ft concrete
   Backyard Basketball Court (30 × 30 ft)	high school, half court	30 × 30 ft sport tile, red key
   Basketball Hoop (In-Ground)	a hoop on its own	6 × 6 ft footprint
   Tennis Court (78 × 36 ft)	ITF doubles + singles	120 × 60 ft hard court
   Pickleball Court (44 × 20 ft)	USA Pickleball	64 × 34 ft hard court
   Volleyball Court (18 × 9 m)	FIVB indoor	24 × 15 m
   Beach Volleyball Court (16 × 8 m)	FIVB beach	22 × 14 m sand
   Badminton Court (13.4 × 6.1 m)	BWF doubles + singles	17.4 × 9.1 m sport mat
   Squash Court (9.75 × 6.4 m)	World Squash singles	a walled court, glass back
   Ice Hockey Rink NHL (200 × 85 ft) / IIHF (60 × 30 m) / Backyard Ice Rink (60 × 30 ft)	NHL / IIHF / plain	the ice inside the boards

   Tap a tile, then Add. The court lands in the middle of the room, selected.

   

2. 2

   Tap the court to set it up

   Select the court and its options sit at the bottom of the item panel (on a phone, pull the panel up by its handle to see them). For a basketball court: - NBA, College, High school or FIBA: which lines are painted. Hover a button for its key numbers, for example NBA lines: 94 × 50 ft court, 16 ft key, 23 ft 9 in three-point line. - Full court or Half court. - Hardwood, Sport tile or Concrete: the surface. Finish → Colors can then repaint the surface any colour. - Hoops: on (a hoop at each basket, rim 10 ft up) or off, for a court you'll use for something else too. - Key: the paint inside the lane: none, blue, red, green or gray. The grey line at the end says which lines you're looking at, e.g. Lines: 94′ × 50′ court. None of these change W × D: the surface you placed stays put; only what's painted on it changes. The other courts have the same kind of row: tennis, pickleball, volleyball and badminton pick a surface and turn the Net on or off; the rink picks NHL, IIHF or Plain markings and toggles Boards, Glass and Goals; squash toggles the Glass back wall. Those are shown sport by sport in Sports court dimensions.

   

3. 3

   Pick the lines: NBA, college, high school or FIBA

   The four line sets differ mostly at each basket, where the game is played:

   Lines	Court (inside the lines)	Key (lane) width	Three-point line
   NBA	94 × 50 ft	16 ft	23 ft 9 in; 22 ft in the corners
   College (NCAA)	94 × 50 ft	12 ft	22 ft 1¾ in
   High school (NFHS)	84 × 50 ft	12 ft (as the app draws it)	19 ft 9 in
   FIBA	28 × 15 m (91 ft 10 in × 49 ft 3 in)	4.9 m (16 ft 1 in)	6.75 m (22 ft 2 in); 0.9 m from the sidelines

   Pick the set for the games that will be played: a school gym usually wants high school lines, a club outside the US FIBA. A high school court is 10 ft shorter than the others, so on the same surface you get more run-off at each end, which you can see in the screenshot.

   The free-throw line is 15 ft from the backboard in every US set (19 ft from the baseline), and the rim is 10 ft (3.05 m) up in all four.

   

4. 4

   Full court or half court, and the surface

   Half court paints one basket end, with the hoop at the back of the surface (at the top of the plan when the court isn't rotated; use Rotate to point it another way). A standard half court is 50 ft across and 47 ft deep; on a big surface the rest becomes run-off, and the half circle of the centre circle shows if there's room for it. A full court runs its length along the W side, with a basket at each end. If a full court is shorter than the standard (a 74 ft gym, say), both baskets, keys and arcs keep their real size and the middle of the court gets shorter, which is how short school gyms are lined. The surface changes the look on the plan and in 3D: - Hardwood: maple strips, for gyms. - Sport tile: the snap-together tiles used for backyard and multi-sport courts. - Concrete: broom-finish concrete with control joints every 10 ft, for driveways and parks.

   

5. 5

   Compare surfaces side by side

   Changing the surface keeps the lines and the key colour, so you can try each one in seconds. White lines are used on sport tile and concrete so they stand out; hardwood gets dark lines. If none of the three matches your floor, keep the closest and change its colour in Finish → Colors.

   

6. 6

   Type your own size: a backyard pad or a bigger gym floor

   Tap the W or D value in the panel and type the size of the slab, floor or lot you actually have. The court's lines don't stretch or shrink with it: they stay regulation size, and you see the part of the court that fits. On a 30 × 30 ft backyard pad you get the key, the free-throw circle and most of the high school three-point arc; type 20 × 20 ft and the arc is gone but the key and free-throw line are still true to size, so you know exactly where a player shoots from. The largest surface you can type is 140 ft for a court (enough for a FIBA court with run-off, or a tennis court on 120 ft) and 220 ft for a rink. Type more and the box says Max 140′. Tip: the court keeps its catalog name, for example Backyard Basketball Court (30 × 30 ft), after you resize it. Tap the name in the panel and type your own, like Driveway court 20 × 20.

   

7. 7

   The size limit message

   If you type a size past the limit, the box turns red and says Max 140′ next to the tick. Change the number, or press × to keep the old size. For a facility bigger than that (two tennis courts side by side, a park), place several courts next to each other, as the Tennis Club and Sports Park templates do.

   

8. 8

   A driveway hoop on its own

   No court, just a hoop by the driveway? Search hoop and add Basketball Hoop (In-Ground): a padded pole with an arm, a glass backboard and a rim 10 ft up, 13 ft tall overall, with the rim about 4 ft out from the pole. Put the pole at the edge of the driveway with the board facing the playing area. Inside a room it will usually get the Flow Check warning Basketball Hoop (In-Ground) is taller than the ceiling, because a standard room is 8 or 9 ft high. That's right: an in-ground hoop needs open sky or a gym ceiling. Either raise the walls in Plan Settings → Ceiling (to at least 13 ft), or, if your plan has a yard, place the hoop in the yard outside the house: nothing in the yard counts as being under a ceiling. Courts themselves lie on the floor like a rug, so their hoops don't trigger this warning; keep an eye on the ceiling yourself when a court goes indoors.

   

9. 9

   Look at it in 3D: hoops, nets, boards

   Open 3D and zoom in on a basket: each hoop has a padded pole behind the baseline, an arm, a see-through backboard with the shooter's square, an orange rim at 10 ft and a net. Nets stand between real posts at their regulation heights (tennis 3 ft 6 in at the posts and 3 ft in the middle, pickleball 36 in and 34 in, volleyball 2.43 m, badminton 1.55 m), rinks get white dasher boards with safety glass and red goals, and squash courts stand as walled boxes with a glass back wall. The court's surface and lines are painted on the 3D floor exactly as on the plan. This is the moment to check the things a flat plan hides: whether a hoop clears a low beam, what the bleachers see, how close the walls feel behind a baseline. See 3D camera controls for orbiting and zooming.

   

10. 10

    A backyard court in 3D

    Here the 20 × 20 ft sport-tile court has its own hoop at the back of the pad, and the separate in-ground hoop stands beside it. In 3D you can judge things the plan can't show: whether the backboard overhangs the pad enough, where a missed shot rolls, and how a 13 ft hoop looks next to a fence or a two-storey house.

    

11. 11

    Add bleachers and benches on the run-off

    Courts and rinks lie flat like a rug, so bleachers, benches and team chairs can stand on the run-off (or right against a rink's boards) without Flow Check calling it an overlap. Search bleachers for the 3-row, 5-row, gym 10-row and wood tier seating; select a run to set its Rows, style and rails (see Plan a gym or event space). Keep them outside the boundary lines, and outside any clear space the sport needs behind the baselines and beside the sidelines. A squash court is different: it's a walled room, so Flow Check keeps everything out of it, and spectators sit in the gallery behind its glass wall.

    

12. 12

    Start from a Sports Facilities template

    On the Home screen tap Use Template (Pre-designed layouts), then the Sports Facilities tab. There are eight:

    Template	What's in it
    Basketball Gym	110 × 88 ft gym, NBA full court, bleachers for about 420
    Pickleball Courts (4)	133 × 83 ft fenced lot, four courts with run-off, benches
    Tennis Club (2 Courts)	two courts on 120 × 60 ft surfaces, a bench by each net
    Badminton Hall (4 Courts)	121 × 75 ft hall, four BWF courts on sport mats, bleachers, 30 ft ceiling
    Volleyball Gym	92 × 83 ft gym, FIVB court on a sport floor, three bleacher runs
    Ice Hockey Arena	220 × 125 ft arena, NHL rink with boards, glass and goals, about 840 seats
    Squash Club (3 Courts)	three glass-backed courts and a gallery with benches
    Sports Park	tennis, two pickleball courts, a basketball half court and beach volleyball

    Tap a card, then Use This Template. It opens as your own design: move courts, change their lines or surfaces, resize the walls. In the outdoor lots (pickleball, tennis, park) the 10 ft walls stand in for the fence.

    

13. 13

    Mix sports in one plan

    Courts are separate items, so a park, a school campus or a big backyard can hold several. The Sports Park template packs a tennis court, two pickleball courts, a basketball half court on concrete and a beach volleyball court into 195 × 117 ft, with benches between them. Place the courts edge to edge on their run-offs, rotate them to suit the sun and the paths, then check the walkways between them with Smart Flow Check.

    

Common mistakes

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