10 Awesome Benefits of Table Tennis

Ping Pong is popular the world over, but most people who play it think they’re only really reaping the benefit of enjoyment. Many don’t realize that there are actually numerous health benefits to playing table tennis. It is a fast-paced sport that can be a great way to get into better shape. It might surprise you how many calories you can burn during a single game of table tennis.

But the benefits of table tennis extend way beyond just being an effective calorie burner. The top 10 benefits include:

1. Improved hand-eye coordination
2. Develops mental acuity
3. Improves reflexes
4. Fewer joint injuries
5. Lose weight
6. Improves cognitive awareness
7. Improves overall coordination
8. Improves balance
9. Stimulates the Brain
10. Helps you make new friends

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10 Benefits of Playing Table Tennis

1. Improves Hand-Eye Coordination

To kick off the health benefits of table tennis, we’ve got hand-eye coordination. You have to be fast and precise to play table tennis, otherwise, you’ll be hitting nothing but air. As one of the fastest racket sports, you need excellent hand-eye coordination to keep a rally alive. Even if yours is not great at first, the more you play, the better it is going to get. 

2. Develops Mental Acuity

They say that doing puzzles improves mental acuity, well, so does playing table tennis. You are playing a high-speed game, and the speed and placement of the ball at any given moment are going to help to develop and improve your mental acuity.

Often, people who are into puzzles are also great at table tennis because they already have these skills, and playing the game makes them even better at puzzles. Plus, it also helps to improve your concentration, mental alertness, and it teaches you to use better tactical strategies against opponents. 

3. Improves Reflexes

Another ping pong benefit is improved reflexes. Table tennis is a fast-paced game, and you need to be able to react in a fraction of a second to move your paddle to strike the ball. To begin with, players may struggle to produce the fine muscle movements needed to return faster shots. However, you’d be surprised how quickly your reflexes develop through regular practice.

This table tennis benefit is especially useful for older individuals whose reflexes are in decline. Working these reflexes through table tennis can help older players in everyday life.

4. Fewer Joint Injuries

One of my favorite table tennis health benefits is how gentle the sport is on the body. Sure it can be very tiring, but you are far less injury-prone playing table tennis than most other sports.

So if you have problems with your knees, back, ankles, and wrists, table tennis is the perfect sport to pick up. This is one of the main reasons table tennis has a greater proportion of older players relative to other sports. If you play smart you’ll likely avoid injury. And if you do contract an injury, it usually has a very fast recovery period. 

Read more on the most common table tennis player injuries here so that you know how to avoid them.

5. Lose Weight

Any type of physical activity can help when you are trying to lose weight because you will be burning calories. However, table tennis doesn’t come across as a great calorie burner. So you’re probably curious as to what the benefits of playing table tennis are concerning weight loss. 

The answer is that table tennis is pretty damn effective! According to a study conducted by the Table Tennis Association of Serbia, table tennis players can expect to burn approximately 503.7-658.4 calories for sessions lasting 83-104.1 minutes. As such, table tennis offers a fun and easy way to lose weight! We prefer it to the treadmill any day!

You don’t have to go nuts with long training sessions. Instead, implement it into your life as a regular physical activity and you’ll soon notice the pounds come off.

Read More: Having the right table tennis shoes helps a lot, that’s why we’ve reviewed the best models on the market. 

 

6. Improves Cognitive Awareness

It has been scientifically proven that a benefit of playing ping pong is that it can help to improve both motor skills and cognitive awareness. Many studies show that playing this game can help to increase blood flow to the brain. This can help you to think more clearly and may even be a way to stall or even prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.

7. Improves Overall Coordination

Not only is improved hand-eye coordination a benefit of ping pong, but so is improved overall body coordination. When playing, you are constantly watching the ball, following its path as it’s hit toward you. So, you will need to have the coordination to be able to hit it back. This means you need to be able to move your body appropriately to get into the right position to play a return.

You may not be too great at it initially, but if you start playing regularly, you will likely notice a huge difference in your coordination. Not just in table tennis but also in everyday life.

8. Improves Balance

In order to be really good at the game, you need to have great balance. Table tennis forces you to adopt irregular body positions, which can be challenging to hold without losing your footing. You’ll find that you’re far more steady on your feet through repeated practice. Not only this, but your core strength will also improve thanks to all the twisting and squat-like movements. 

While improved balance will translate to better performance on the table, you’ll probably notice it more in your everyday life. Working on this is especially important for older folks, as balance deteriorates with age.

9. Stimulates the Brain

There are two advantages of table tennis regarding keeping your brain sharp. For starters, you have to anticipate the other player’s shots, and for this, you will be using your prefrontal cortex which lets you plan your moves strategically. This is an often-overlooked benefit of table tennis.

Then, there is the aerobic exercise you get from table tennis. This will help stimulate the hippocampus — the part of the brain that helps you learn things and retain what you’ve learned. Thus improving your memory.

10. Helps You Make New Friends

Moving past the physical advantages, we come to the emotional benefits of table tennis. Table tennis is a very social sport, and its small playfield encourages conversation. This means it’s easy to chat with friends or talk with strangers. You can’t say the same for tennis — you’d be screaming across the court!

Table tennis also has a very wide age demographic, exposing you to people from all walks of life. At my local club, we have teens all the way up to 80-year-old table tennis players! As a result, it’s almost impossible not to make new friends. It just happens naturally.

Summary of the Benefits of Table Tennis

The health benefits of table tennis are clear. And one of the advantages of table tennis is that you can play it at home with little set-up time. However, you should remember to set some time out for table tennis warm-up exercises before though, as they’ll help prevent injuries.

If you are considering taking up table tennis, go for it! With all the benefits it brings, the sport is hard to ignore. Table tennis is a great way to challenge yourself while simultaneously working on your mental health. You’ll make friends in no time and have more people you can practice with.

Enjoy this read? Check out these posts

• Basic Table Tennis Skills You Need to Know
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• 7 Great Ways to Practice Table Tennis Alone
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