Improve Your Consistency in Badminton

Badminton consistency is an often overlooked concept on improving your level. Many players often think if they can have a steeper drop shot or a stronger smash shot, they will instantly become a better player. However, this is not the only important aspect in badminton! In this post, we will explore what badminton consistency is and a few ways that we can improve it!

What is Consistency?

Generally, we can define badminton consistency in 2 main ways.

1. Shot Consistency - The percentage of shots that you hit over the net and in the court.
2. Quality Consistency - How often you hit your shots with the same quality.

These 2 factors define consistency and as expected, the more consistent you are on the court, the less mistakes you will make, and the more opportunities you will have to win more points.

Improving Your Shot Consistency

To improve your shot consistency, you will need a lot of repetition for each of your individual shots. Of course, you can’t expect to be able to hit a shot over the net consistently if you do not spend and time practicing it. Here are a few drills that you can try to work on your shot consistency.

1. Basic shot drills - Pick one shot at a time you want to work on (clear, drop, smash, etc.). With a training partner, ask them to hit the same shot over and over to you for the shot that you want to practice. For example, if you want to practice your clear, ask them to serve a bird to the back of the court. All you will do is hit a clear back, making sure you hit the shot over the net and in the court. Keep repeating!
2. Placement Drills - For more advanced players, give this drill a try. Have a drilling partner stand in one corner of the court, for example the front right corner. This partner can hit it anywhere on the court, you just need to get to the shot and return the shot to them without making simple mistakes! This will help you work on your consistency from all corners of the court in a more realistic scenario.

Drills are crucial for success in badminton and the more you can work on drills like these, the better your consistency will eventually get.

Improving Your Quality Consistency

Generally, your quality consistency comes along with playing more badminton and with practicing your shot consistency. As you play more matches and more badminton in general, you will find that it becomes harder to win points against higher level players, and thus you will find ways to hit stronger shots or tighter drops.

However, if you want to fine-tune your quality and bring your shots to the next level in a more focused manner, I would highly recommend technique training.

In technique training, you are only focused on one shot at a time, standing still, using little to no movement. The goal of this is to help you remember the muscle memory it takes to hit a shot of high quality. One prime example is when you are practicing net drops. A partner can help throw birds to the front of the court while you stand there. All you will do is try and hit the net shot with as much spin and as close to the white tape of the net as you can. With enough repetition, you will be able to see that most of your net drops are closer to the tape and will have more spin!

Consistency is Crucial

Consistency is one of the most important aspects of a badminton player’s game. As you can imagine, if you make too many mistakes you are just giving your opponent free points! Take time to improve your consistency if you want to improve in badminton. Be patient and over time, you can see your consistency and your overall game improve.

If you need other gear to supplement your badminton game, make sure you stop by our online store to check out our vast collection!