Offside and icing, explained.

Offside: the basic rule

All three rulebooks read for this site start from the same sentence: attacking players must not go into the attacking zone ahead of the puck (IIHF Rule 83.1, NHL Rule 83.1, Hockey Canada Rule 6.11). What counts is where the skates are, not the stick. A player is offside when both skates are completely over the leading edge of the blue line at the moment the puck completely crosses that edge. One skate touching the line keeps a player onside.

The detail of what a "skate" is varies:

• IIHF Rule Book 2026/27 (Rule 83.1): a player is onside if either skate touches the blue line or has not broken the vertical plane rising from its leading edge. Only the blade counts as the skate.
• NHL Official Rules 2026-2027 (Rule 83.1): the same plane test, and the skate is the blade only. Scouting the Refs reported that the blade-only definition was written into the NHL rules for 2025-26.
• Hockey Canada Playing Rules 2026-28 (Rule 6.11): only a skate that is in physical contact with the ice is used to decide offside, and the question does not arise until the puck has completely crossed the blue line.

Carrying the puck in

A puck carrier often crosses the line slightly ahead of the puck. All three rulebooks allow that, but only with control. Under the NHL's 2026-2027 Rule 83.1, the carrier must have possession and control of the puck with the stick before the trailing skate crosses the line, and must keep control after the puck enters the zone. Scouting the Refs reported that this wording arrived for 2025-26 and ended onside rulings on pucks kicked into the zone. The IIHF made the same change a season later in Rule 83.1 of its 2026/27 rule book: possession and control with the stick before both skates cross. Hockey Canada's 2026-28 Rule 6.11(c) also requires possession and control gained before both skates cross.

Each rulebook also ignores offside when a player legally brings the puck back into their own defending zone while an opponent is already there.

Delayed offside

When an attacker is offside but the defending team can play the puck, the linesperson can hold up the whistle. Under the IIHF's 2026/27 Rule 83.3 the call is wiped out if all the offending players leave the zone together, touching the blue line, or the defenders move the puck out into the neutral zone. Play is stopped if an attacker touches the puck, chases a loose puck, forces the carrier deeper or is about to make contact with them. Hockey Canada's 2026-28 Rule 6.11(b) wipes out the call in the same two ways, and stops play if an attacker touches the puck or tries to gain possession of a loose puck in the zone. It adds that a goal cannot count if the puck goes in during a delayed offside, even if the attackers have cleared the zone before it enters the net. Its Rule 6.11(d) adds an intentional offside, called when a player knowingly plays the puck in a delayed-offside situation or carries it in knowing teammates are offside; the faceoff then goes to the offending team's own end.

In the NHL, a defending team can use a coach's challenge to review a goal it believes followed an offside entry (NHL Rule 38.2(a), 2026-2027).

USA Hockey's 2025-29 rules, as USA Hockey described them on 16 September 2025, allow delayed (tag-up) offside in Youth 15 Only and older and in Girls 16U and older. USA Hockey also said it had removed the automatic whistle for a puck shot on net into the attacking zone while attackers were still in the zone.

Icing: the basic rule

Icing applies when a team at equal or greater strength shoots, bats or deflects the puck from its own half of the ice (the centre red line is the divider) past the opponents' goal line (IIHF Rule 81.1, NHL Rule 81.1). Hockey Canada's 2026-28 Rule 6.7 adds kicking to the list, and says it is not icing if the puck goes into the net.

To avoid icing, the IIHF and NHL rules say a team must "gain the line": the puck, while on the stick and not the skate, must touch the centre red line. Icing is also cancelled when an opponent other than the goaltender could have played the puck before it crossed the goal line, or when the puck touches an opponent on the way (IIHF Rule 81.5, Hockey Canada Rule 6.7(c)).

Hybrid icing

Under hybrid icing, the linesperson decides the race for the puck early instead of letting players chase it into the end boards. The IIHF's 2026/27 Rule 81.1 and the NHL's 2026-2027 Rule 81.1 describe the same two-step judgment:

1. First, the linesperson judges whether the puck will cross the goal line.
2. Then the linesperson decides which player, attacker or defender, would touch the puck first, deciding no later than the moment the first player reaches the end-zone faceoff dots, with the skate as the reference point.

The test is who would touch the puck first, not who reaches the dots first. If the race is too close to call at the dots, icing is called. If the goaltender plays the puck, pretends to, or skates toward it, the icing is waved off (IIHF Rule 81.3, NHL Rule 81.3).

CBS Sports reported on 30 September 2013 that NHL players approved hybrid icing for the 2013-14 season after a preseason trial, with the aim of cutting injuries from races into the boards.

Hockey Canada's 2026-28 rules use hybrid icing only in some categories. Rule 6.7(e) applies it in U18 AAA and Junior, and in Senior if the Member chooses. Elsewhere, the basic rule in Rule 6.7(a) calls icing once the puck crosses the goal line, unless an exception applies.

After an icing

Nothing here replaces the rules of your own league, which can differ in detail, so check them before you play.