How to Use a Football Kicking Tee: Setup, Technique and Practice
The tee is doing more work than you think — and setting it up carelessly quietly costs you accuracy on every single rep.
The short version: find firm level ground, press the tee in so it seats rather than perches, set the ball with the laces facing your target, keep the ball near-upright for field goals or tilted back for kickoffs, and check all of that before every single kick. Those five things take about three seconds and they are the entire difference between a tee that helps you and a tee that adds a variable.
Most kickers buy the right tee and then use it on autopilot. That is a genuine waste, because the whole reason a tee improves your kicking is that it gives you an identical ball position every repetition. Set it inconsistently and you have reintroduced the exact problem you bought it to remove. This guide covers the setup properly, then how to actually practise with it.
📋 What’s in this guide
What the Tee Is Actually Doing
It is worth being precise about this, because understanding the mechanism tells you what to protect.
A kicking tee does three things. It lifts the ball off the ground so your foot meets clean air underneath rather than digging into turf. It holds the ball at a consistent angle so your contact point is repeatable. And it puts the ball in the same position relative to your plant foot on every attempt.
The third one is the important one and the one people overlook. Improvement in kicking comes from repeating the same motion until it becomes automatic. If the ball sits differently each time, you are not repeating anything — you are improvising a slightly different kick every rep, and improvisation does not consolidate into skill.
This is why a sloppy setup is worse than it sounds. It is not merely untidy. It actively removes the benefit you are training for. A kicker who sets the tee carefully for thirty reps has taken thirty repetitions of one motion. A kicker who eyeballs it has taken thirty repetitions of thirty slightly different motions, and will improve considerably more slowly for the same effort.
The tee is not a convenience. It is the thing that makes your practice count as practice rather than as exercise.
Setting It Up, Step by Step
Five steps, three seconds, every rep.
- Find firm, level ground. Scan for divots, soft patches and slopes before you place anything. Uneven ground tilts the tee, a tilted tee tilts the ball, and a tilted ball leaves on the wrong line before you have taken a step. On a well-used practice field the area in front of the posts is often the most chewed-up ground available — move a few yards sideways rather than accepting it.
- Press the tee into the surface. Give it a firm downward push so the base seats into the turf. A seated tee stays put when you plant beside it; a perched one can shift, particularly on a fast kickoff approach. On hard or frozen ground you cannot seat it properly, which is one reason those surfaces produce inconsistent kicking.
- Place the ball with laces forward. Facing your target, every time. This gets its own section below because it matters more than any other single setup detail.
- Set the tilt deliberately. Near-upright with a slight backward lean for field goals. A pronounced backward lean for kickoffs. Deciding this consciously rather than accepting whatever happens is what separates a setup from a placement.
- Check before you commit. One glance from your starting position: laces forward, ball stable, tee seated, ground level. If anything looks off, fix it now rather than kicking anyway and wondering why the ball went left.
💡 Build it into your routine. The setup should become as automatic as your steps. Kickers who treat it as a separate chore skip it under time pressure — which is precisely when consistency matters most.
The Laces Rule
If you take one thing from this guide, take this. The laces of a football are a raised, hard, uneven strip. Everywhere else on the ball is smooth panel. Those two surfaces behave completely differently when struck.
Hit the smooth panel and the ball leaves predictably, with the spin and direction your swing intended. Hit the laces and the contact is uneven, the ball squirts unpredictably, and the resulting miss has no pattern you can learn from. It will simply feel like you mis-hit it, and you will go looking for a technique fault that does not exist.
This is genuinely one of the most common causes of unexplained misses in developing kickers. They log twenty kicks, see misses scattered in every direction with no pattern, conclude their technique is inconsistent, and start rebuilding a swing that was working fine. The actual cause was that they were not checking the laces.
How to get it right
Point the laces directly at your target. Not up, not sideways, not vaguely forwards. Directly at the point you intend to hit. Then check again immediately before you start your approach, because wind can rotate a ball on a tee and because you may have knocked it while stepping off your marks.
On kickoffs, where your approach is longer and faster, the gap between setting the ball and striking it is bigger — so the check matters more, not less.
⚠️ If your misses have no pattern, check your laces before you change anything about your technique. Random, directionless misses are far more often a laces problem than a swing problem, and the fix costs nothing.
Tilt: Field Goals Versus Kickoffs
The angle you set the ball at is the setup decision with the largest effect on ball flight, and the two jobs want opposite things.
Field goals: near-upright
A field goal wants a fast, flat trajectory. You need enough height to clear the outstretched hands of the rush, and after that every additional degree of launch angle is forward travel you are giving away. So the ball sits close to upright with only a slight backward lean.
Kickers who over-tilt on placekicks produce a ball that climbs beautifully and lands short, then conclude they lack leg strength. They do not — they are trading distance for altitude they did not need.
Kickoffs: pronounced backward lean
A kickoff wants height and hangtime, because every extra tenth of a second in the air is more time for your coverage team to travel downfield. The backward tilt opens up the underside of the ball so you can genuinely get beneath it.
This is why dedicated kickoff tees are shaped differently. A flat placement tee physically cannot hold the ball at the angle a kickoff wants, which is why using one for kickoffs costs you hangtime no matter how well you strike it.
📚 If you do both jobs, own both tees. They are inexpensive and the difference in ball flight is immediately obvious. Our kickoff tee guide and placement tee guide cover the options for each.
Ground and Surface
The surface you set the tee on changes how it behaves, and most kickers never think about it until something goes wrong.
Grass, well-maintained. Ideal. The tee seats properly, grips well, and stays where you put it. Look for an area that has not been churned up by previous sessions.
Grass, worn or muddy. The tee will seat deeply but may sit unevenly, and mud gets into the ridges and stops the ball seating properly. Clean the tee between reps if it is genuinely muddy, and choose your spot rather than accepting the nearest patch.
Artificial turf. Firmer and more consistent than grass, but the tee cannot seat into it the same way — it sits on top. That makes base weight and grip more important, and it is one reason heavy rubber outperforms light plastic noticeably on turf.
Hard or frozen ground. The worst case. You cannot seat the tee at all, so it will shift readily. Test with a few three-quarter effort kicks before going full power, and expect reduced consistency regardless.
Indoor surfaces. Usually very consistent, though harder underfoot, which increases the impact load on your plant leg. Worth slightly more warm-up attention.
How to Practise With It
Once your setup is reliable, the tee enables the practice that actually builds skill.
Groove the motion at short range first
The single most valuable drill available to a kicker is thirty kicks from twenty yards with an identical setup every time. It is boring, which is why people skip it, and it is where consistency is built. The tee is what makes it possible — without one, those thirty kicks are thirty different problems.
Use it to isolate variables
Because the tee holds the ball still, you can deliberately change one thing and observe the effect. Strike five kicks low on the ball, five at centre, five high, and watch how dramatically the trajectory changes. That experiment is impossible with a holder and enormously instructive.
Work angles, not just the centre
Move the tee across the field. Three kicks each from far left, left hash, centre, right hash, far right. Games are rarely from the middle, and below the NFL the hash marks are wide enough that angled attempts are a large share of real kicks.
Practise the setup itself
Occasionally run a session where you deliberately focus on the setup rather than the kick — twenty reps of placing the tee and ball perfectly, taking your steps, and then walking away without kicking. It sounds absurd and it builds the habit that holds up when a game clock is running.
Our beginner drills guide gives a full eight-week structure built around tee work, and the Drill Generator will build individual sessions.
Setup Mistakes That Cost You
❌ 1. Not checking the laces
Produces directionless misses with no learnable pattern, and sends kickers hunting for imaginary technique faults.
✅ Fix: Laces at the target, checked immediately before the approach.
❌ 2. Placing the tee without looking at the ground
A divot or slope tilts the ball and sends the kick off-line before you move.
✅ Fix: Scan for level, firm ground first. Move a few yards if needed.
❌ 3. Perching rather than seating the tee
An unseated tee can shift during your approach, especially on kickoffs.
✅ Fix: Firm downward press every time.
❌ 4. Over-tilting on placekicks
Produces a high, short kick and the false conclusion that you lack leg strength.
✅ Fix: Near-upright for field goals. Save the lean for kickoffs.
❌ 5. Letting mud build up in the ridges
Stops the ball seating securely, so it shifts fractionally at contact.
✅ Fix: Clean it during wet sessions, not just afterwards.
❌ 6. Rushing the setup under time pressure
The setup is the first thing to get skipped when you are hurrying, and the moment consistency matters most.
✅ Fix: Make it part of your routine so it happens without a decision.
Using a Tee in Bad Weather
Weather affects the tee as much as it affects the kick.
Wind can rotate the ball on the tee between placement and contact, which is exactly how a checked-laces setup becomes an unchecked one. On windy days, check immediately before starting your approach rather than when you first place the ball. In strong wind, some kickers place the ball later in their routine specifically to reduce that window.
Rain makes the ball slippery on the tee and reduces grip in the ridges. Expect the ball to seat less securely and check it more carefully. A wet tee also gets muddier faster.
Cold makes rubber stiffer and the ground harder. You may not be able to seat the tee properly on frozen ground, and cheap plastic tees can become brittle enough to crack. This is one of the clearest practical arguments for heavy rubber over plastic.
Heat is mostly a storage problem rather than a use problem — a tee left in a hot car can warp, and a warped base will not sit flat.
Our Weather Impact Planner covers the kicking adjustments that go alongside these setup ones.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which way should the laces face on a kicking tee?
Directly at your target. The laces are a hard, raised, uneven strip, and striking them produces unpredictable ball flight with no consistent pattern.
Check them immediately before you start your approach rather than when you first place the ball, because wind can rotate the ball on the tee.
How much should I tilt the ball on the tee?
It depends on the kick. For field goals, keep the ball close to upright with only a slight backward lean — you want a fast, flat trajectory. For kickoffs, use a pronounced backward lean so you can get underneath the ball for height and hangtime.
Over-tilting on a field goal is a common cause of kicks that climb well and land short.
Does it matter where I put the tee on the field?
For practice, yes — find firm, level ground rather than accepting the nearest patch. The area directly in front of the posts on a practice field is often the most worn ground available.
Uneven ground tilts the tee, which tilts the ball, which sends the kick off-line regardless of how well you strike it.
Should I use a tee if my league uses a holder?
Yes, for practice. Every level uses tees in training because they let you take far more quality repetitions than working with a holder allows.
If you compete with a holder, split your week — tee work for technique and volume, at least one session weekly on the full operation for timing and realism.
How do I stop the tee moving during my approach?
Press it firmly into the turf so the base seats rather than perching on top, and use a heavy rubber tee rather than a light plastic one. Weight and grip both matter, especially on kickoffs where your approach is fast.
On artificial turf or hard ground where the tee cannot seat, base weight becomes the main thing keeping it in place.
Teaching Someone Else to Set Up a Tee
If you coach, or you are a parent helping a child start out, the setup is the easiest thing to get right early and the hardest habit to fix later. A kicker who spends two years eyeballing the placement has built a routine that actively works against them, and unpicking it takes months.
Teach it as a fixed sequence rather than as a set of principles. Ground, seat, laces, tilt, check — in that order, spoken aloud at first. Children in particular respond well to counting the steps out loud, and the verbalising is what turns a conscious process into an automatic one.
Resist the urge to let it slide when they are excited to kick. The moment a young kicker learns that the setup is optional when you are in a hurry is the moment it becomes optional permanently. Ten careful kicks genuinely beat forty rushed ones at that stage, and the habit you build in the first month tends to persist for years.
When the Setup Is Not the Problem
Worth being balanced about this. A meticulous setup will not rescue a kick with a genuine technique fault behind it, and it is possible to over-focus here.
If your misses form a clear, consistent pattern — always left, always short, always the same way — that is almost certainly a technique issue rather than a setup one. A bad setup produces scatter; a bad swing produces a pattern. Knowing which you have tells you where to spend your attention, and our accuracy drills guide maps specific patterns to the fault behind them.
The setup matters because it removes a variable, not because it fixes anything. Get it right, then stop thinking about it and go work on the thing your data is actually pointing at. Kickers who obsess over placement while ignoring a curved approach are optimising the wrong link in the chain.
💡 A useful test: log twenty kicks and look at the shape of your misses. Scattered in all directions suggests setup inconsistency. Clustered to one side suggests technique. Both fixable, but with completely different work.
📚 One closing thought. Of everything in this guide, the laces rule is the single item most worth internalising immediately. It costs nothing, takes half a second, and eliminates an entire category of misses that would otherwise send you looking for problems in your technique that were never there.
Setup Checklist
- Scanned for firm, level ground before placing anything
- Tee pressed firmly in so it seats rather than perches
- Laces pointing directly at the target
- Laces re-checked immediately before the approach
- Tilt set deliberately — upright for field goals, leaned back for kickoffs
- Ridges clear of mud
- One final glance from your starting position
- Same setup sequence every single rep
- Setup treated as part of the routine, not a separate chore
- Extra laces check on windy days
The bottom line: the tee’s entire value is that it gives you an identical ball position every repetition, and a careless setup throws that away. Three seconds of deliberate placement — level ground, seated tee, laces forward, correct tilt — converts your practice from thirty different kicks into thirty repetitions of one. That is the difference between kicking a lot and actually improving.
Keep Going
🛒 Choosing a TeeA step-by-step buyer’s walkthrough
🏈 Beginner DrillsEight weeks built around tee work
🏉 Field Goal TechniqueWhat happens after the setup
General technique information. Confirm tee legality for your league with your coach before competition.