Last Updated on April 24, 2024 by Alex Horscroft
While obtaining one-to-one table tennis coaching is the quickest way to improve, it’s damn expensive! But fear not, you don’t need to go that route. There are many excellent FREE table tennis resources online to take advantage of.
In no particular order, here are my favorite places for table tennis lessons:
- Ping Skills
- Expert Table Tennis
- EmRatThic
- Samson Dubina
- Table Tennis Univiersity
- Tom Lodziak
- Gregs TT Pages
- STIGA (Drill Your Skills)
- World Table Tennis
- Dynamic Table Tennis TV
- Ping Pong Ruler
- Yangyang TT
- Table Tennis Teacher
The 13 Best Free Online Table Tennis Coaching Resources
1. Ping Skills
Kicking things off we have Ping Skills which happens to be my favorite place for table tennis lessons. Although I learned how to play mostly from my own observation and analysis, Ping Skills was my go-to place for detailed breakdowns.
It’s a YouTube Channel run by Olympic coach Alois Rosario and Jeff Plumb, an Olympian. What I like the most about their videos is that they’re not full of fluff — it’s just solid coaching in bite-size chunks. Each video is typically 2 to 7 minutes.
What’s more, they have 371 videos on their channel, and almost all of them center around lessons. As such, I feel that they are the most comprehensive source of ping pong lessons on the web. Their table tennis coaching is great for beginners through to an advanced level.
2. Expert Table Tennis
Expert Table Tennis is a blog run by professional coach Ben Larcombe. You may well have come across the blog before, as it was Ben who ran the Expert in a Year Challenge that went viral with over 12 million views.
The blog has tonnes of excellent articles to dive into and I feel it’s one of the best table tennis blogs out there. I really like Ben’s conversational style of writing, and there’s no doubt he knows his stuff. Fun fact: I was fortunate enough to write a series of articles for Expert Table Tennis a while back!
3. Ping Sunday
EmRatThic runs a popular blog (Ping Sunday) and YouTube channel that boasts over 188,000 subscribers.
Coach ERT is based in France where he provides table tennis classes for young players during the most crucial stage of their development. In terms of free resources, EmRatThic probably provides more than anyone else. Not only is his blog packed full of posts, but he also has 2,200 videos on his YouTube channel.
However, I do feel his videos are not as useful as some of the other channels on this list. Mainly because they are not as targeted at beginners and many are rather niche, such as the videos analyzing particular players. That being said, if you’re a table tennis fanatic, you’ll almost certainly find some value in his content.
4. Samson Dubina
Samson is one of the best table tennis coaches. He works with the US National Team and has received Coach of the Year on four occasions.
He runs a very informative blog where he hosts all sorts of table tennis lessons. Here, you can see that his knowledge supersedes many other blogs. He has an eye for the game and has many highly specific articles that focus on particular areas that few others write about.
Besides his blog, he also has a YouTube channel, but this is less focused on teaching players.
5. Table Tennis University
Table Tennis University is a training course taught by coach Tao Li, a former Chinese national champion. The course is broken down into three levels, unfortunately, the Core and Mastery levels are locked behind a paywall. However, TT University provides table tennis beginner lessons in the Starter Skills unit.
Within Starter Skills Tao Li explains the basics of table tennis such as grip, footwork, and the fundamental strokes. In total, there are 3 hours of video to watch which is pretty exceptional when you consider it is taught by a Chinese national champion.
6. Tom Lodziak
Tom Lodziak is a professional coach based in the same area as me. We even played once in a league match a few years back.
He runs a blog and YouTube channel that has a staggering 239,000 subscribers making him the biggest table tennis coaching YouTube Channel (just ahead of Ping Skills).
His videos are superb and just about all of his 215 videos focus on coaching, so there are lots of table tennis instructional lessons to watch. What distinguishes him from other channels is that he features many players in his videos. This is in the form of experts who provide additional coaching info, or regular players, allowing Tom to discuss their style of play.
7. Gregs TT Pages
Gregs TT Pages is a website that has been going since 2005. As best I can tell Greg hasn’t added to the website since February 2020, but this hardly matters.
His TT Pages are filled with ping pong lessons for beginners, intermediate players, and advanced players. Like Samson Dubina, many of his articles are highly focused, meaning you will find useful content here that you will struggle to find anywhere else.
My only complaint is that the website is not as well-linked as it could be, meaning it can be hard to find the posts you are after. Nevertheless, it’s a top website for table tennis coaching at home.
8. STIGA (Drill Your Skills)
Learning from the experts is one of the best ways to learn, and thanks to STIGA, you can!
They partnered with the Chinese National Team to produce a video series called Drill Your Skills. While they are in Chinese, subtitles are provided so it’s easy to follow along.
There are 10 videos to watch so there’s not a lot of content, but it still provides a lot of value.
9. World Table Tennis (How to Play Table Tennis)
Similar to the Drill Your Skill series, you can also check out the How to Play Table Tennis series run by World Table Tennis. The videos feature professional players and each is less than 4 minutes long making them easily digestible.
In total, there are 10 videos to watch, and bar one video, they all cover basic strokes. As such, it’s not a good resource for skilled players. However, I do feel it’s effective for teaching table tennis to beginners. You will of course need to supplement by watching material from elsewhere though.
10. Dynamic Table Tennis TV
Brian Pace is a player and coach who runs Dynamic Table Tennis TV, a YouTube channel with over 42,000 subscribers. He doesn’t post as much educational content as he used to, but he has loads of excellent older table tennis lessons that are timeless.
One in particular that I liked was his Perfect Forehand Loop video. He simply explained the stroke better than most and used annotations to facilitate his explanations. A great video all around!
11. Ping Pong Ruler
Ping Pong Ruler is one of the largest table tennis blogs online. While they mostly focus on product reviews, they have a fair share of content centered around teaching table tennis as well.
12. Yangyang TT
Yangyang TT is a YouTube channel run by Yangyang which has almost 60,000 subscribers.
Here she provides online ping pong lessons that cover all sorts of material. Beginners and skilled players alike will learn a lot from watching her content.
To date, she has 219 videos to watch, and almost all of them center around some form of coaching.
13. Table Tennis Teacher
I may be newer to the table tennis coaching scene, but I still feel that I should throw my hat into the mix!
On my blog, I cover every aspect of table tennis coaching that I feel is useful to players — all for free. Many of my posts are very specific, and you’ll struggle to find similar resources elsewhere. I have a particular fondness for breaking down table tennis tactics as my high match IQ has served me very well over the years. I also feel it’s a very neglected aspect among players, so I’m seeking to educate!
Closing Thoughts
Receiving one-to-one training is the quickest way to improve, but this is not viable for most people due to the expense. Fortunately, there are lots of great table tennis lessons online available for free.
I recommend you check out each of the sources I referenced in this list to see which resonates the most with you. Enjoy!
I've been playing table tennis since the age of 14 and have competed against some of the top players in England. While I love playing, I also really enjoy coaching too!
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