Can you play pickleball on a padel court?

More and more clubs are asking, and the short answer is yes. The long answer has three details worth knowing before you reach for the tape.

One warning first: a figure going around online says two pickleball courts fit inside one padel court. They do not.

The arithmetic

A padel court is 20 by 10 metres. A pickleball court is 13.41 by 6.10.

One fits comfortably: over 3 metres are left free at each end, which is ample room to play.

Two side by side? Two pickleball widths come to 12.20 metres, and the padel court is only 10 wide. They do not fit. One does.

First detail: the lines

Mark them with tape in a different colour, or paint them. That is it. The simplest of the three steps and the one nobody argues about.

Second: the net

A pickleball net is lower than a padel one: 86 centimetres at the centre against 88. Two centimetres, but the real difference is in post height and width.

The usual solution is a portable pickleball net set up in front of the padel net, leaving the existing installation untouched.

Third, and the one that matters: the walls

In padel the glass is part of the game. In pickleball it simply does not exist.

So agree it before you start: a ball that touches the glass or the mesh is out. If nobody says it out loud on day one, there will be an argument on day one.

One padel court, two sports. No building work and no touching the glass.

Watch the surface

This is what most people overlook. The sand-filled artificial turf on most padel courts slows the plastic ball down enormously, and it barely bounces to begin with. The game turns slow and strange.

On resin or porous concrete the ball runs properly and the experience is what it should be. If your court is sand-filled turf, factor that in before you announce anything.

And the ideal, when a club can afford it, is still one court per sport. This is a way to start, test the demand and avoid investing blind.