Target sports
Billiards
Billiards covers several cue games, especially pocketless carom forms and English billiards. Control of cue-ball path, cushions, cannons, winning hazards, and losing hazards determines long scoring sequences.
At a glance
- Carom tables have no pockets and are often heated for faster cloth.
- English billiards uses a pocketed snooker-style table.
- Only three balls are required in the principal forms.
Player profile. Requires delicate cueing, exact angle calculation, touch, patience, and the ability to plan several contacts ahead. The player plans routes through multiple contacts rather than treating one pocket as the entire objective. Cushion rebound, running side, and exact pace determine whether a scoring stroke also leaves another opportunity.
Where it happens
Carom uses a pocketless rectangular table; English billiards uses a full-size six-pocket table with baulk markings. A pocketless carom table has cushions flush around a heated cloth, while the longer English table adds six pockets and baulk markings. Both principal forms use only two cue balls and one red object ball.
- Carom uses a pocketless rectangular table; English billiards uses a full-size six-pocket table with baulk markings. A pocketless carom table has cushions flush around a heated cloth, while the longer English table adds six pockets and baulk markings. Both principal forms use only two cue balls and one red object ball.
What you need
- cue
- three balls
- chalk
- heated or standard cloth table
- rests where used
How to play
- Assign a cue ball to each player and set the three balls for the chosen code.
- Begin from the designated baulk or head-area position.
- Plan a stroke that reaches the required balls or hazards in sequence.
- Track the appropriate counts and penalty transfers.
The essential rules
- Each player is assigned one of the two cue balls.
- Carom starts with the red on the foot spot.
- The opponent’s cue ball begins on the head spot in carom.
- The breaker’s cue ball starts within 15 cm of the head-string center spot.
- The first carom stroke must contact the red before the other cue ball.
- Striking the wrong assigned cue ball is a foul.
- Playing two consecutive safety shots is a foul.
- A carom foul costs the turn and cancels any count from that stroke.
- English billiards begins with the red on the top spot.
- The English-billiards breaker places the cue ball inside the D.
- Failure to strike any ball gives the opponent one point.
- Pocketing the cue ball without another contact gives the opponent three points.
How the result is decided
A carom count is made when the striker’s assigned cue ball contacts the red and the opponent’s cue ball in one stroke. In English billiards, a cannon is worth two, while pocketing or going in off the red scores three and the opposing cue ball scores two. English billiards adds two-point cannons and pocket hazards worth two or three, allowing several kinds of score in one stroke.
Fouls and penalties
- striking the other player’s cue ball
- two safety shots in succession
- failing to contact any ball in English billiards
- cue ball pocketed without contacting another ball
Techniques
- plain-ball carom
- follow
- draw
- sidespin
- cushion route
- hazard shot
- nurse
Tactics
- leave balls close
- control cushion angles
- develop a repeating scoring pattern
- deny an easy leave
Disciplines and variants
- carom billiards
- English billiards
- three-cushion billiards
Competition landscape
- World Billiards Championship
- UMB carom championships
Records in the reference
No stable record table is published here. Records change; use the current governing-body source before acting.
How the sport developed
Billiards evolved from European lawn-and-table games into pocketed and pocketless cue-sport families. Heating later helped carom cloth remain fast and consistent, while English billiards retained the larger pocket table.
- Heating the carom table reduces moisture and lets balls travel more consistently.
Play it in India
Caution · No pathway, recognised federation or public facility for this sport was found in India in KhelPath's current sources. You can learn the sport here; you may not be able to practise it competitively in India today. This is not evidence that the sport is absent from India; it is a gap in current public evidence.
- Organisation reference
- No dated organisation reference found
- Recognition state
- Not established by the current MYAS snapshot
- SAI NCOE discipline rows
- No matching centre row found
- Khelo India discipline
- Not established
- Olympic programme
- Not a current core-programme sport
- India Olympic medals
- No sport-level total in current sources
Evidence and currency
This is an original KhelPath explainer assembled from editorial research. It is orientation, not an authoritative rulebook.
Current governing-body rules link: not yet verified.