Personal foul (basketball)

In basketball, a personal foul is a breach of the rules that concerns illegal personal contact with an opponent. It is the most common type of foul in basketball. A player fouls out on reaching a limit on personal fouls for the game and is disqualified from participation in the remainder of the game.

Players routinely initiate illegal contact to purposely affect the play, hoping it is seen as too minor to be ruled a foul. The threshold is subjective and varies among officials and from game to game. Most contact fouls are not regarded as unsportsmanlike. However, excessive or unjustified contact is penalized more severely. The NBA refers to these as flagrant fouls; other rulebooks call them unsportsmanlike or disqualifying fouls.