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Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
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title, slug, language, url_path, meta_description, cornerstone
| title | slug | language | url_path | meta_description | cornerstone |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| State of Padel Q1 2026: Global Market Report | state-of-padel-q1-2026 | en | /state-of-padel-q1-2026 | 77,355 padel courts worldwide, +29% in 18 months. Global market data from FIP, Playtomic/PwC, and Padelnomics' independent pipeline of 12,400+ venues across 80 countries. | C4 |
State of Padel Q1 2026: Global Market Report
In June 2025, the Fédération Internationale de Padel recorded 77,355 padel courts worldwide — a 29 percent increase in under 18 months. For context: in 2021, the total stood at roughly 22,000. The sport has grown by more than 240 percent in four years.
Padel is no longer a niche sport or a Mediterranean curiosity. It is infrastructure. The same way cities built tennis clubs in the 1980s and gym chains in the 2000s, they are now building padel facilities — financed by institutional capital, tracked by PwC, covered on ESPN.
This report synthesises data from three independent sources: the FIP World Padel Reports 2024 and 2025 (federation-reported global and country-level data), the Playtomic/PwC Global Padel Report 2025 (platform-level economics for clubs on the Playtomic booking system), and the Padelnomics data pipeline (an independently scraped and deduplicated dataset of 12,441 venues across 80 countries and 5,492 cities). Together, these sources produce the most complete market picture publicly available. Where they diverge, we explain why.
Global Snapshot: The Numbers
Player base
| Metric | End 2023 | October 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amateur players worldwide | ~25–30M | >35 million | — |
| Licensed / federated players | 600,000 | 850,000 | +42% |
| Pro-ranked players | ~4,874 | 11,125 | +128% |
| Junior-ranked players | ~1,209 | 4,219 | +249% |
The doubling of pro-ranked players in two years reflects circuit expansion more than a talent explosion: as FIP has professionalised the tournament calendar and lowered barriers to FIP ranking points, more players have earned rankings. Still, 11,000+ ranked professionals globally puts padel ahead of squash and approaching tennis in terms of structured professional competition.
Courts and clubs
- 77,355 courts worldwide (FIP, June 2025) — +29% since early 2024
- 24,627+ clubs across 150+ nations
- 87 national federations — up from 71 in the FIP 2024 report
- 3,282 new clubs opened in 2024 (+26%), averaging nearly 9 per day
- 7,187 new courts built in 2024 (+17%)
One important caveat on the headline court count: the Playtomic platform count, which only captures courts with active online booking via Playtomic, stands at 50,436. The delta — roughly 27,000 courts — reflects facilities that operate without digital booking infrastructure. In emerging markets like Germany, this gap is proportionally larger (FIP: 875 courts in Germany; Padelnomics pipeline: 359 tracked venues), which itself tells a story about the market's digital maturity.
Geographic distribution
| Continent | Player share | Courts |
|---|---|---|
| Europe | 61.3% | ~51,000 |
| South America | 19.0% | ~14,100 |
| Central & North America | 7.7% | ~3,976 |
| Asia | 6.8% | ~4,633 |
| Africa | 4.9% | ~3,389 |
| Oceania | ~0.3% | ~110 |
Europe commands two-thirds of global courts — but as the next section shows, European distribution is far from even.
Top 12 countries by court count (FIP 2025)
| Rank | Country | Courts |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Spain | 17,300 |
| 2 | Italy | 10,220 |
| 3 | Sweden | 4,220 |
| 4 | Argentina | 4,220 |
| 5 | France | 4,000 |
| 6 | Netherlands | 3,500+ |
| 7 | Belgium | 2,150 |
| 8 | Mexico | 2,000+ |
| 9 | Chile | ~2,000 |
| 10 | Denmark | ~1,560 |
| 11 | Portugal | 1,560 |
| 12 | Saudi Arabia | 1,127–1,575 |
Germany — Europe's largest economy — does not appear on this list.
Europe Leads — but the Map Is Uneven
With 51,000+ courts, Europe has roughly two-thirds of global padel infrastructure. But Spain alone accounts for 17,300 of those — 34 percent of the entire European total.
Strip out Spain and the picture looks different: non-Spain Europe has grown its court count approximately six-fold in three years. The drivers are Italy (now 10,220 courts), Sweden (4,220), France (4,000), and the Netherlands (3,500+). The emerging competitive landscape is no longer Spain-vs-everyone; it is a genuinely multi-market industry.
Saturated markets (Spain, Netherlands, Sweden): Court density in these markets is high enough that new entrants face meaningful competition. The investment thesis shifts from first-mover advantage to operational excellence — better amenities, superior booking experience, coaching programs.
Growth markets (France, UK, Germany): Demand structurally exceeds supply. Playtomic classifies the UK and Germany as "Growth" phase on its global maturity curve, indicating that new supply will be absorbed quickly. France is transitioning from Growth to early Consolidation.
Early markets (Austria, Eastern Europe, Baltics, APAC): Infrastructure exists but is thin. Higher risk, higher potential for early movers.
The operational metric that distinguishes these categories is courts per 100,000 inhabitants, combined with occupancy rates for existing venues. High-density markets (5+ per 100K) where occupancy is falling signal oversupply. Low-density markets (<1 per 100K) with high GMV growth signal an investment window.
Germany: A Case Study in Structural Underservement
No market illustrates the mismatch between demand and supply more clearly than Germany. The numbers are striking enough to warrant close examination.
| Country | Courts | Population | Courts per 100K |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spain | 17,300 | 47M | ~37 |
| Sweden | 4,220 | 10M | ~42 |
| Netherlands | 3,500+ | 17M | ~21 |
| France | 4,000 | 68M | ~6 |
| Germany | 875 | 84M | ~1.0 |
(Sources: FIP World Padel Report 2025; Padelnomics pipeline)
Germany has roughly one-twentieth the court density of the Netherlands and one-fortieth that of Sweden. It is absent from the FIP top-12 list despite being the largest economy and fifth-most-populous country in Europe.
Why the demand signal is strong
This underdevelopment is not a demand problem. The Playtomic/PwC Global Padel Report 2025 shows Germany with the highest GMV growth per court in Europe: from €2,700 to €4,000 per court per month (+48% year-on-year). The UK saw a larger absolute increase (+74%, reaching €9,700/month), but Germany's relative growth from a lower base indicates that every new venue entering the market is capturing unmet demand quickly.
Player retention backs this up. 88% of first-time Playtomic bookers in Germany return for a second booking — the second-highest retention rate globally, behind Spain's 93%. The sport's stickiness in Germany is not in question.
Booking price data adds further context. Germany's average booking rates on Playtomic:
| Booking type | Average price/hour |
|---|---|
| Player / club bookings | €43 |
| Open matches | €48 |
| Academy classes | €44 |
| Leagues | €50 |
| Tournaments | €71 |
This pricing is roughly midway between France (€29–32) and the UK (€52–65) — appropriate for a market in early growth with limited competition.
City-level picture (Padelnomics pipeline)
The Padelnomics pipeline tracks 359 venues across 245 German cities. The density picture for Germany's major cities:
| City | Venues tracked | Per 100K | Market score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berlin | 20 | 0.55 | 74.1 |
| Hamburg | 15 | 0.81 | 76.1 |
| Munich | 12 | 0.81 | 76.1 |
| Cologne | 8 | 0.78 | 75.9 |
| Frankfurt | 5 | 0.67 | 74.4 |
| Mannheim | 8 | 2.53 | 86.5 |
| Heidelberg | 5 | 3.22 | 90.1 |
(Padelnomics Market Score 0–100 weights venue density, purchasing power, population density, and market maturity)
Germany's three largest cities all sit below 1.0 venues per 100,000 inhabitants. Comparable cities in Spain or Sweden typically show 5–15+. Even mid-sized cities like Mannheim and Heidelberg — where supply is relatively better developed — show higher market scores, suggesting that pent-up demand converts to measurable economic activity once venues exist.
For a fuller analysis of where to build: Padel Hall Location Analysis Guide (C5). For cost planning: Complete CAPEX Breakdown (C2). For financing: Germany Padel Hall Financing Guide (C6).
The Professional Circuit Is Scaling Fast
The most underappreciated demand driver for local operators is the growth of the professional circuit. Media coverage creates first-time players.
FIP's calendar for the first half of 2025 included 132 tournaments (+86% vs H1 2024) across 38 countries (+81%), played by 3,266 professionals (+35%) representing 91 nationalities. For a circuit that barely existed outside Spain five years ago, this is rapid institutionalisation.
Prize money:
| Event level | 2023 | 2024 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Premier Padel P2 | €150,000 | €250,000 | +67% |
| Year-end Finals | — | €600,000 total | — |
Broadcast reach: 242 territories (H1 2024), with 350,000+ in-person attendees at 14 tournaments across 12 countries. Digital reach: 30+ million page views on padelfip.com in H1 2025, 680,000 social followers.
For operators, the circuit's growth matters for two reasons. First, media visibility drives first-time player acquisition — people who discover padel on TV or social media, then seek a local venue. Second, professional events function as marketing spend for the sport as a whole, funded by the circuit's commercial partners rather than local clubs.
What the Data Means for Operators and Investors
Three analytical frames emerge from this data set.
Frame 1: Saturation vs. white space
The appropriate question for any market entry is not "is padel growing?" — it is "does supply match demand here?" The combination of low venue density and high GMV growth (Germany: 0.55–0.81 venues per 100K in major cities, +48% GMV) is the clearest possible signal that supply is the constraint, not demand. In markets where venue density is already 10+/100K and GMV growth is single-digit, the competitive dynamic is fundamentally different.
Frame 2: The timing window
Market gaps close. Typically, the three-to-five years following a market's transition into the growth phase are when early operators achieve above-market returns: demand is unmet, competition is limited, and real estate is still available at pre-boom prices. After that, institutional capital arrives, sites become expensive, and margin compression follows. Germany in 2026 appears to be at a position analogous to the Netherlands in 2018–2019 — shortly before its growth acceleration — based on comparable penetration rates and demand indicators.
Frame 3: Cities are not interchangeable
The city-level heterogenity within Germany is substantial. Berlin's 0.55 venues/100K is very different from Heidelberg's 3.22 — even though both are "underdeveloped" by European standards. Location selection within an underserved market matters enormously. The Padelnomics market score captures the relevant variables: venue density, catchment population, purchasing power, and competitive landscape.
Methodology and Sources
This report uses three data sources with different coverage and limitations:
FIP World Padel Reports 2024 and 2025 (freely available PDFs): Federation-reported data, covering all registered courts in member countries including those without digital booking. Strengths: complete national coverage, consistent methodology across years. Limitations: relies on self-reporting by national federations of varying quality; does not capture sub-national or city-level data.
Playtomic Global Padel Report 2025 (Playtomic / Strategy& / PwC): Platform-level economics data from Playtomic's booking system. Strengths: highly accurate GMV, pricing, and retention data for venues on the platform. Limitations: covers only Playtomic-integrated venues; systematically undercounts markets (like Germany) where Playtomic adoption is lower.
Padelnomics pipeline (independent collection): Scraped and deduplicated data from Playtomic listings and OpenStreetMap, cross-referenced with population data. Total coverage: 12,441 venues in 80 countries and 5,492 cities — including 359 venues in 245 German cities. The Padelnomics dataset is smaller than FIP's reported totals because it only captures venues with digital presence; its unique value is city-level granularity that neither FIP nor Playtomic publishes.
The three-source methodology matters because each source has systematic blind spots. FIP undercounts economically because it misses the commercial/booking dimension. Playtomic undercounts structurally in low-adoption markets. Padelnomics undercounts venues without digital presence but adds the geographic granularity. Using all three together produces a more complete picture than any single source allows.
Disclaimer: This report is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. All market assessments are based on publicly available data. Specific investment decisions require site-specific due diligence.
Padelnomics updates the underlying data pipeline quarterly. Subscribe to the Padelnomics data briefing to receive updated analyses as new data becomes available.