The sport originated in Victorian England, where it was played among the upper-class as an after-dinner parlour game.It has been suggested that makeshift versions of the game were developed by British military officers in India around the 1860s or 1870s, who brought it back with them.A row of books stood up along the center of the table as a net, two more books served as rackets and were used to continuously hit a golf-ball.



The name "ping-pong" was in wide use before British manufacturer J. Jaques & Son Ltd trademarked it in 1901.The name "ping-pong" then came to describe the game played using the rather expensive Jaques's equipment, with other manufacturers calling it table tennis.The next major innovation was by James W. Gibb, a British enthusiast of table tennis, who discovered novelty celluloid balls on a trip to the US in 1901 and found them to be ideal for the game. This was followed by E.C. Goode who, in 1901, invented the modern version of the racket by fixing a sheet of pimpled, or stippled, rubber to the wooden blade. Table tennis was growing in popularity by 1901 to the extent that tournaments were being organized, books being written on the subject



Although both a "Table Tennis Association" and a "Ping Pong Association" existed by 1910.



a new Table Tennis Association was founded in 1921, and in 1926 renamed the English Table Tennis Association.The International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) followed in 1926.London hosted the first official World Championships in 1926.



In the 1930s, Edgar Snow commented in Red Star Over China that the Communist forces in the Chinese Civil War had a "passion for the English game of table tennis" which he found "bizarre".On the other hand, the popularity of the sport waned in 1930s Soviet Union, partly because of the promotion of team and military sports, and partly because of a theory that the game had adverse health effects.In 1933, the United States Table Tennis Association, now called USA Table Tennis, was formed.

In the 1950s, paddles that used a rubber sheet combined with an underlying sponge layer changed the game dramatically, introducing greater spin and speed.



These were introduced to Britain by sports goods manufacturer S.W. Hancock Ltd. The use of speed glue beginning in the mid 1980s increased the spin and speed even further, resulting in changes to the equipment to "slow the game down". Table tennis was introduced as an Olympic sport at the Olympics in 1988.