What’s the Right Age to Start Volleyball?


Sometimes as parents we wonder and even worry about whether we should encourage our kids to jump into a sport or whether we should possibly slow them down until they’ve gotten a little older. When it comes to volleyball, it’s no different.

So, what’s the right age to start playing volleyball? The most common age for players to join a volleyball team is 8 or 9 years old, while the largest age group in most volleyball clubs is the “12s” (also called U12) category which is made up of 11-year-olds.

It’s good for younger children that are 5, 6, or 7 years old to start playing games that are similar to volleyball or based on volleyball skills even though they may not be big enough and physically able to play full-scale volleyball. For examples of these kinds of games, you can visit this article called: Teaching Volleyball Skills in P.E. Class Using Games.

The idea is that you want to allow your young athlete to develop the tools and skills that will prepare them for playing the sport later on.

What’s the Youngest Age At Which I Should Let My Child Play?

That’s really a question that’s common to most parents across all sports and unfortunately, the answer is usually, “it depends.” Let’s look at each area and I’ll offer some thoughts to consider while you’re making your decision.

5th Grade Volleyball

School Volleyball Teams

Although each area may differ, in the U.S.A. school system, girls usually have school volleyball teams starting in the 7th grade. Some schools may offer it at younger ages, but pretty much everywhere has it by 7th grade.

If your school has a large enough pool of students, they will usually have a 7th-grade team and an 8th-grade team. If it’s smaller, you may just have an 8th-grade team made up of players from both grades.

While there are advantages to getting your child in at the earliest stage so they can begin to develop and grow as a player, I wouldn’t feel like I had to rush earlier than this. If your school has a program that starts earlier that could be a benefit, but honestly, you don’t want your child to burn out on the sport by starting them too soon.

I would also encourage playing more than one sport because your athlete will develop complementary skills, stay a little fresher by not only focusing on the one, and they’ll have the chance to pick their favorite down the road.

YMCA Volleyball Teams

This can be a great way to venture into volleyball at the beginning and there are a few really important benefits. The Y offers volleyball for ages 8 through 14.

The commitment is minimal. You have a pretty low commitment both financially and time-wise when you play at the Y. Depending on whether your a YMCA member or not it ranges from $110 to $150.

It’s set up for about an 8-week game schedule where you practice for an hour and play once each week, with a couple of weeks of just practice before the first game. You’re not usually driving very far as long as there are enough teams to play in your area. All this for a pretty low price.

You can learn with a whole group of strangers. While this can be intimidating, it can also be freeing. You can mess up, make mistakes, and learn the sport without feeling the peer pressure of knowing your school friends are watching and judging. For some kids, this is HUGE!

Guaranteed to make the team and play. The YMCA has designed it’s youth sports as an entry to encourage kids to be able to try new sports. You sign up and you’re in! Most coaches simply rotate the players through like you would in gym class so everyone gets equal playing time.

Club Volleyball Teams

When you decide to enroll in club volleyball, you’re stepping up in many ways. You’re making financial, time and possible travel commitments.

The youngest ages for club volleyball is the 10’s age group. Whenever you see a number for the age group, the players are under that. So when I say my daughter plays on a 12’s team, all the players are under 12. So most clubs will have children that are 9 years old (and maybe a couple of 8-year-olds) playing on their youngest teams.

If you’re trying to decide if you’re ready for that, shop around. Talk to the different clubs and ask them about:

What is their practice schedule? At the youngest ages, the practice schedule should not be too intensive. But the good thing is that they are getting a dedicated volleyball coach who enjoys the sport who WANTS to help them succeed and grow. Unfortunately, this is often not the case anywhere else.

How many tournaments they go to and where are they? Don’t underestimate what this means. You could have anywhere from 3 in-town tournaments to 8 or 9 tournaments that have you traveling all across the states. Usually, the younger kids have fewer tournaments and keep most of them fairly close, but ask for details.

When they travel do you have to stay and play? Stay and play is a requirement at some tournaments where a certain number of parents and players of each team are required to stay at a hotel that’s coordinated by the tournament. As you can imagine, this can rope you into paying some pretty high prices if you’re not careful!

At the end of these questions, you have to make the call. Is your 9-year-old ready for this? Are YOU ready for this? If you’d like more help pondering clubs specifically, check out this post: How Much Does Club Volleyball Cost, and Is It Worth It?

How Do You Get Started Playing Volleyball?

Most of us have our first experience with volleyball as with many common sports, in gym class. Our P.E. coach would announce that the next unit would be volleyball and line us all up in a “3 rows of 3” rotation.

While this isn’t very good volleyball exactly, it’s a good thing to expose everyone so that those that are interested can try it out and decide if they want to explore it further. The tough part with gym class is that most of the kids don’t want to play it or don’t know how to play it well, so sometimes it’s not very fun.

After playing in school Phys. Ed. class, most will decide to try out a community program like the YMCA. Your community center may offer youth sports. Another common way to find youth teams is through a local church.

The church we attend has a “family volleyball night” about twice per month. There’s no cost, no commitment, everyone just shows up, we divide into teams and we play and have fun.

Call and ask around and if you find one that has a similar program, you can usually talk to some of the members and find out about many others. This way you can find one that fits for you and your family.

How Expensive Is Playing Volleyball?

In each of the areas, cost fluctuates. For the most part, your community programs are going to be pretty cheap. They’re designed as an entry-point and they try to keep the costs and travel to a minimum.

School programs can fluctuate from completely free to a spirit pack that costs $100’s. It really depends on the demographic of your school, how well the sports programs are funded and how the coaches run their programs. The good thing is, for the most part, once you pay the spirit pack fee, all you usually have to pay after that is the entry fee to the games.

Once you choose to join a club, you’re going to have some serious costs. Even the cheapest clubs are going to usually cost at least $1000 for your season dues, most will be much higher than that. Then you have to consider the cost of traveling to the tournaments.

How Can I Tell If Volleyball Is the Right Sport For My Child?

There are really 3 characteristics that you need to have to make a long-term plan to commit to volleyball:

Height – Not every single player needs to be tall, but overall, taller players have more success in volleyball. Just being tall isn’t all it takes, but all things being equal, if you’re tall, you’re going to have a strong advantage in every position except playing libero (or maybe defensive specialist).

You may be thinking that there are a lot of setters that aren’t tall, and that’s true. But honestly, if you could have a setter that’s 5’5″ that you would grade as a 9-out-of-10 setter or a 5’10” setter that you also grade as a 9-out-of-10, which one is going to get the spot? The taller setter is automatically going to be more of a force at the net when they play the front row.

Speed – While you could make a case that speed is a weapon in every sport, some sports require it, while with others it’s more of a bonus. The kind of speed needed in volleyball is reaction speed, decision making, and moving your feet to position yourself for success.

Scrappiness – The willingness to dig, dive, and overall hustle is absolutely essential in volleyball. We see players all the time that don’t have specific attributes you normally look for; the height, the high vertical leap, the perfect technique, yet they excel.

How do they succeed? These are the scrappy players that will fight you every inch of the way, every rally, every point, every set. They’re willing to take it to the floor, run into the stands or crash into the scorer’s table if that’s what it takes.

Can I Start Playing At 14 Years Old (or Even Older)?

You absolutely can start playing at age 14, 15 or even older. This is a very common question. My question to you is: “How bad do you want to play?”

The challenge may be steep. Other kids will surely have been playing for years and be very very good. The question is, what are you willing to do to beat them for a spot on the team?

You would never know how old this famous player was when he started playing volleyball if I didn’t tell you. Click here to read all about his story.

The history of sports is filled with names and stories of great players that didn’t start until much older than other kids. There are people like Michael Jordan who famously tried out in 9th grade for his basketball team and was cut. That fueled his passion to practice all year to make the team the next year and move on to eventually become one of the greatest to ever play the game.

What Kind of Shoes Do You Wear For Volleyball?

Many teams wear matching shoes.

If you’re going to play volleyball for any team, you should have a pair of shoes that are just for playing volleyball and they are only worn inside. As you become more competitive, you do need to choose some shoes that are actually designed for volleyball.

Just like basketball players should wear basketball shoes and runners should wear running shoes, volleyball puts serious demands on your feet and volleyball shoes are designed to do things for you: protect your feet and improve performance.

Consider the cost of a good pair of shoes to be an investment into both the enjoyment of playing the sport and reducing the wear and tear your feet will take from all the jumping and changing directions you’re going to be doing.

In some cases, your team will purchase shoes together through a spirit pack or a club equipment pack. While this is nice because they all match and you know the coach is choosing a good quality pair of shoes, you can sometimes find your specific needs may not be met. If your athlete is complaining of sore feet beyond what you think should be normal, consider finding another pair.

You will have to decide that you’re going to work harder and longer to improve faster and have a better attitude and dedication than the others you’re trying to pass. This article has a few tips if you decide to take on this challenge: 11 Steps to Make the Volleyball Team With No Experience.

Photo Credits:

Feature image by Lena Ritter on flickr.com: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

5th Grade Volleyball image by Shelby L. Bell on flickr.com: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/, cropped to center.

Team huddle image by popo.uw23 on flickr.com: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

Players on the bench image by popo.uw23 on flickr.com: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

Jeff Lacroix

Jeff Lacroix is a lifelong volleyball player and in his late 40's, still enjoys mixing it up on the courts.

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