A bad time-out request is not always an immediate point penalty.

Scope of this explanation

This page applies the FIVB Official Volleyball Rules 2025-2028, approved by the 39th FIVB World Congress in 2024 and implemented for competitions beginning after 1 January 2025. The controlling provisions are Rules 15 (interruptions) and 16 (game delays), with related substitution and Libero procedures.

It covers six-player indoor volleyball under the international FIVB baseline. Beach volleyball, NCAA, NFHS, national federations, professional leagues and local tournaments may use other totals or procedures. Their appointed rulebook and competition regulations control. A limited FIVB 2026 test is identified separately below.

Two per team, per set, normally 30 seconds

FIVB Rule 15.1 permits each team a maximum of two time-outs in each set. Rule 15.4.1 makes every requested time-out 30 seconds. The allowance starts again in each new set; unused time-outs do not carry over.

For FIVB, World and Official Competitions, FIVB may approve a different duration at the organizer’s request. During a time-out, Rule 15.4.2 sends the players in play to the free zone near their bench. A broadcast or event format should therefore be checked before treating 30 seconds as universal outside the baseline.

Who may ask and how

Rule 15.3.1 names only the coach or, in the coach’s absence, the assistant coach or game captain. Related Rules 5.1.2.3 and 5.3.2 clarify the handover: the game captain confirms when an assistant coach assumes the coach’s functions; otherwise the game captain makes the requests. The team captain is the game captain while on court; if that player is off court, another on-court player is assigned the role.

The requester shows the official time-out signal: one palm over the vertical fingers of the other hand to form a “T.” At FIVB, World and Official Competitions, Rule 15.4.1 requires the buzzer first and then the hand signal. A competition outside that category must follow its adopted request procedure, but the FIVB baseline does not enlarge the list of authorized people.

After the rally, before the service whistle

FIVB defines an interruption as the period between one completed rally and the first referee’s whistle for the next service. Rule 15.4.1 allows the request only when the ball is out of play and before that whistle.

The decisive boundary is the whistle, not the server’s contact with the ball. A request made at the moment of, or after, the whistle is already improper under Rule 15.11.1.1. The request does not cancel the authorization to serve or create a time-out merely because the server has not yet struck the ball.

Time-outs and substitutions can share one dead-ball period

Rule 15.2.1 permits requests for one or two time-outs and one substitution request by either team to follow one another within the same interruption. A team does not need a completed rally between its two time-outs. By contrast, two separate substitution requests by the same team normally require a completed rally between them; all intended simultaneous substitutes should enter the substitution zone together.

There is an important stop condition. Under Rule 15.2.4, after a request has been rejected and sanctioned with a delay warning, that team may not request another regular interruption before the end of the next completed rally.

Four requests the referee must reject

Rule 15.11.1 classifies a request for a regular interruption as improper when it is made:

• during a rally, or at the moment of or after the whistle for service;
• by a team member who is not authorized under Rule 15.3.1;
• for a second separate substitution by the same team in the same interruption, subject to the rule’s injury, illness, expulsion and disqualification exceptions; or
• after the team has exhausted its authorized time-outs or substitutions.

“Improper request” describes the request and its record; it does not by itself mean the opponent receives a point.

Rejected and recorded—if it causes no delay

Under Rule 15.11.2, a team’s first improper request of the match is rejected and entered on the score sheet without another consequence only when it does not affect or delay the game. This one-time treatment belongs to the team for the whole match, not once per set or once per requester.

If the action actually defers the restart, Rule 16 applies instead. The first-improper-request provision is not a licence to interrupt the service sequence or extend a dead-ball period.

The test is whether the team defers resumption

Rule 16.1 defines a delay as an improper team action that defers resumption of the game. Its non-exhaustive list includes delaying a regular interruption, prolonging one after an instruction to resume, requesting an illegal substitution, repeating an improper request, and another delaying act by a team member.

Related rules make some outcomes explicit. A substitute who is not ready when entering the substitution zone causes the request to be refused and the team to be sanctioned for delay (Rule 15.10.3.2). In a simultaneous multiple-substitution request, legal substitutions proceed but an illegal one is rejected and is subject to a delay sanction (Rule 15.10.4).

Count team delays across the entire match

1. First team delay: a delay warning, recorded on the score sheet, with no point awarded.
2. Second and every later team delay: a delay penalty—a fault that gives the opponent one point and the service.

Rules 16.2.1-16.2.3 make these team sanctions. The count combines every type of delay by every member of that team and survives set changes. A delay imposed before or between sets is applied in the following set under Rule 16.2.4.

A wrist card signals delay, not personal misconduct

The first referee signals a delay warning by covering the wrist with a yellow card and a delay penalty with a red card (FIVB Diagram 11, signal 25). The card identifies the level of the team delay record.

That is different from the misconduct scale in Rule 21, where cards address conduct by an individual team member and can lead to expulsion or disqualification. A yellow card shown at the wrist should not be reported as “the coach has a personal yellow card.”

How to rule on a requested time-out

1. Identify the competition rulebook and any event-specific interruption procedure.
2. Confirm that the rally has ended and the first referee has not yet whistled for service.
3. Confirm that the coach—or, if the coach is absent, the assistant coach or game captain—made the request correctly.
4. Check that the team still has one of its two time-outs for that set.
5. If any test fails, decide whether this is the team’s first improper request of the match and whether it affected or delayed play.
6. If it is a delay, check the team’s match-long delay record: first means warning; second or later means point and service to the opponent.

The coach signals after the service whistle

Situation: in an FIVB 2025-2028 match, the first referee whistles for service and the coach immediately forms the time-out signal. The request does not disrupt the server or delay play, and the team has no earlier improper request.

Ruling: reject and record the request, but do not award a point or issue a delay warning. It is too late under Rules 15.4.1 and 15.11.1.1, while Rule 15.11.2 supplies the no-further-consequence result because it is the team’s first improper request and caused no delay.

An unauthorized player asks, then the coach asks

Situation: between rallies, a bench player requests a time-out. The official immediately rejects and records this first improper request without delay. Before the service whistle, the present coach makes the proper signal and the team still has a time-out.

Ruling: grant the coach’s time-out. Rule 15.2.4 blocks another regular interruption only after a rejected request that was also sanctioned with a delay warning. On these facts there was no delay warning, and the later request independently meets Rules 15.3 and 15.4.

An extra time-out request is not automatically a point

Situation: a team has used both time-outs in the set and requests a third. It is the team’s first improper request of the match and the request is rejected without slowing the restart.

Ruling: record an improper request with no further consequence under Rule 15.11.2. If the same team later makes another improper request, Rule 15.11.3 turns that repetition into a delay. If that is also the team’s first delay, the result is a delay warning—not yet a point.

Different acts still share one delay count

Situation: Blue prolongs a first-set time-out after being told to resume and receives its first delay warning. In set three, a Blue substitute enters the substitution zone not ready to play.

Ruling: refuse the substitution request and award the opponent a point and service. Rule 15.10.3.2 makes the unready substitution a delay; Rules 16.2.1-16.2.3 count it as Blue’s second team delay even though a different person and different type of act caused it in another set.

The challenging team may be barred from a time-out

On 27 February 2026, FIVB announced a “reduce breaks” test for the 2026 Volleyball Nations League, FIVB Volleyball U17 World Championships and 2026 Continental Championships. After a challenge result is transmitted, the team that requested the challenge may not request a time-out before the next rally; the non-challenging team keeps that right. FIVB says the restriction applies to both end-of-rally and mid-rally challenges.

This is a named-competition test for the 2026 international season, not a replacement for Rule 15.4 in every FIVB-style match. For another event, use its specific competition handbook and challenge regulations rather than importing the trial.

Four shortcuts that give the wrong result

• “The first bad request always gets a warning”: not when it is the team’s first improper request and causes no effect or delay.
• “Every later delay is by the same person”: the sanction count belongs to the team and combines all members and delay types.
• “The server has not hit the ball, so a time-out is still available”: the legal request window closed at the service whistle.
• “A yellow card always belongs to one person”: a yellow card held against the wrist is the first team delay warning.

FIVB source material

• FIVB Official Volleyball Rules 2025-2028 — implementation statement on page 1; Rules 5.1-5.3, 15.1-15.4 and 15.10-15.11; Rules 16.1-16.2; Diagram 9b and official hand signal 25.
• FIVB Official Volleyball Rules page — identifies the 2025-2028 edition as the current indoor edition commissioned by the 39th FIVB World Congress.
• FIVB Board of Administration: rule tests for 2026 competitions, 27 February 2026 — named events and the post-challenge time-out restriction.

Source note: checked against the FIVB materials above on 28 August 2026. The baseline rulebook applies to competitions beginning after 1 January 2025; FIVB event handbooks, approved time-out lengths and 2026 test instructions may supplement it. No NCAA, NFHS, beach-volleyball or domestic variation is asserted on this page.