Get coaching
This page explains what governing bodies, standards bodies and researchers publish. It is not a substitute for lessons from a qualified coach or for medical advice.
Read every number on this page as a claim, not a measurement. The bodies and groups below define a player differently, survey different populations and count over different periods, so a figure for one sport cannot be set against a figure for another. They are kept in separate sections for that reason.
Tennis
| Claim | Who claims it, and when |
|---|---|
| Just under 106 million people play tennis across the 199 nations that contributed data, up from 84.4 million in 2019 | ITF Global Tennis Report 2024 (third edition), as reported by the LTA on 28 November 2024 and in a summary of the ITF's release |
| The USA has the most players (23.8 million); Great Britain has the highest share of its population playing (13.4 per cent) | The same report, from a search summary of the ITF's release; the ITF page was not opened |
| About 5.6 million adults in Britain played in a year (10 per cent of the population), and about 3.6 million children | LTA, November 2024 |
| A target of 140 million players by 2035, up from 106 million | World Tennis, as reported by the IPC on 26 June 2026 (a target, not a count) |
Pickleball
| Claim | Who claims it, and when |
|---|---|
| About 24.3 million Americans played in 2025, up from about 4.2 million in 2020; the fastest-growing US sport over the past three years, with growth of about 171.8 per cent from 2022 to 2025 | SFIA, pickleball participation page |
| 19.8 million players (2024 data), the fourth year running as the fastest-growing sport | SFIA 2025 Topline Participation Report, from a search summary of a SportsTravel article; not opened |
| 48.3 million US players, from 2023 research using a different method | The APP, as cited on a court-finder business's statistics page (search summary) |
| 15,910 locations and 68,458 known courts at the end of 2024 | USA Pickleball's 2024 Annual Growth Report, citing a commercial court database without explaining the two measures |
The SFIA and APP figures disagree by a wide margin and rest on different methods; both are given. USA Pickleball's own membership counts, which it reports separately from player numbers, are on pickleball bodies and tours: 62,260 in its 2024 report, against Wikipedia's 104,828 for January 2025. The same USA Pickleball report calls pickleball America's fastest-growing sport for a fourth year without naming a source for that claim.
Padel
| Claim | Who claims it, and when |
|---|---|
| About 40 million amateur players in 191 countries and territories, 47 per cent of them women, and more than 91,000 courts | FIP World Padel Report 2026 (third edition, presented 12 October 2026, built from 70 national federations' survey returns), as quoted in the FIP's release of 20 October 2026 |
| 58,334 courts and about 19.4 million players worldwide, using a different method | A Global Padel Report 2026 published by a court-booking business with a consultancy, from a search summary of a padel news report; not opened |
| About 1.07 million Americans played padel in 2025 | SFIA, pickleball participation page |
| Roughly 275 padel courts in the UK in mid-2023 | The Padel Paper, 5 July 2023 |
| 109,040 player licences in Spain in 2024, 8 per cent more than in 2023, with nearly 40,000 (36 per cent) held by women | The FIP, reporting Spanish Padel Federation figures in February 2025, from a search summary of its Spanish-language report; not opened |
The FIP's world totals and the other report's differ widely, and each uses its own method; both are given.
Squash
No dated participation figure from World Squash was found for this site. The only scale figures found are the PSA's own, undated and seen in a search summary of its careers page: more than 1,400 registered players and more than 600 events across the PSA Squash Tour and PSA Challenger events. Those count professional players and events, not people who play.
Badminton
No dated participation figure from the BWF was found for this site; the BWF's websites could not be opened. The BWF's membership, as distinct from player numbers, is on badminton bodies and tours.
Why the numbers do not add up
There is no figure here for "racquet sports" as a whole, and none should be built from this page. The tennis figure counts people in 199 contributing nations; the SFIA counts Americans; the FIP total is built from 70 federations' returns; the squash and badminton gaps are real gaps. Each number answers its own question, asked by its own source.
Sources
- LTA, Britain at the forefront of global rise in tennis participation (28 November 2024)
- ITF, Global Tennis Report: participation hits 106 million in five years (search-result summary)
- International Paralympic Committee, ITF becomes World Tennis (26 June 2026)
- SFIA, U.S. pickleball participation
- SportsTravel, SFIA releases 2025 Topline Participation Report (search-result summary)
- Operator statement: pickleball statistics page citing the APP (search-result summary)
- USA Pickleball, 2024 Annual Growth Report (14 January 2025)
- Wikipedia, USA Pickleball (secondary)
- FIP, World Padel Report 2026 presentation (12 October 2026)
- FIP, World Padel Day release (20 October 2026)
- Operator statement: Global Padel Report 2026, as reported by Padel Addict (search-result summary)
- The Padel Paper, LTA padel coaching (5 July 2023)
- FIP, Padel in Spain: growth of courts and player licences in 2024 (February 2025; search-result summary)
- PSA, careers page (search-result summary)