Our prediction: pickleball will expand here this year

There’s no country story today where it would usually be, about halfway down this page. That’s because we’re actually covering three different countries in this issue, and they all have the same thing in common: they’re poised for unusual growth.

Each has enough infrastructure, momentum, and sport-adjacent culture to make the game feel less like an import and more like something that could genuinely stick.

If pickleball’s next leap is going to happen somewhere, it’ll probably look a lot like one of the three places below.

→ This Week: Where pickleball is (physically) going next

If pickleball’s next global leap is going to be real, it probably won’t come from a place that is merely “interested.” It’ll come from a place that already has the ingredients: courts, organizers, adjacent racquet-sport habits, and enough momentum to turn curiosity into weekly play.

Right now, three spots stand out as most likely to see a big (or, in some cases, an even bigger) boom this year: India, the Gulf, and Germany.

India is the clearest bet because the sport is already well-past novelty there.

The All India Pickleball Association says it now has activity across 24 states and 10,000 active players, and Bengaluru alone has become a serious signal flare: local reporting citing the Karnataka State Pickleball Association says that city alone has 400+ courts, with another 100 courts spread across other districts in the state.

That matters because breakout markets usually show density before they show national dominance. India now has both: a governing structure and visible urban court saturation.

The bigger reason India makes the list is cultural fit. Pickleball works best where people want something social, flexible, and easier to access than legacy club sports without feeling unserious. India’s large metro centers already support exactly that kind of after-work, community-driven sports culture.

Once a city reaches the point where courts stop feeling scarce and start feeling normal, players no longer need to be evangelists just to find a game. India looks closer to that threshold than almost anywhere else in the world.

The Gulf, especially the UAE, with Saudi Arabia alongside it, is a different kind of expansion story. This is not a pure grassroots case; it’s an acceleration case.

Reuters reported that Pickleball World Rankings launched in Dubai with a planned world tour whose Middle East stop carried $1.5 million in prize money. In May 2025, Dubai’s inaugural Pickleball Open brought 275+ players from 15+ countries, backed by the Dubai Sports Council. At the facility level, Dubai Sports World officially lists pickleball among its core sports, and PickleTurf is already marketing indoor courts at multiple Dubai locations.

The Gulf has climate reasons to prefer indoor sport, capital to build premium venues, and governments that increasingly use sport as infrastructure rather than ornament. Saudi Arabia’s official statistics agency said 59.1% of adults were getting at least 150 minutes of weekly physical activity in 2025, a sharp sign of a population being pushed toward sport and recreation at scale.

Pickleball does not need to become the region’s largest sport to matter there. It just needs to become the next sport ambitious cities decide to host, brand, and build around.

Germany is the most interesting European bet because it does not need to invent racquet culture from scratch. The German Tennis Federation says it has 1,517,087 members, 8,640 clubs, and 44,454 courts. That is an enormous base of existing sports infrastructure.

Meanwhile, the 2025 European Pickleball Team Championships drew 30 countries, a sign that Europe’s competitive map is filling in quickly, and Germany is part of that broader buildout.

Germany’s case is less flashy than India’s or Dubai’s, but that may be exactly why it’s strong. If India is the biggest upside play, and the Gulf is the fastest commercial accelerator, Germany may be the best “conversion” market: a place where clubs, coaches, and players already understand courts, memberships, ladders, and league culture.

So those are my three: India for scale, the Gulf for speed, and Germany for structure. The next great pickleball market probably won’t be the one making the most noise today, it’ll be the one assembling all the pieces needed to make the game stick.

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That’s how many people across 12 Asian territories have played pickleball at least once, according to UPA Asia and YouGov, which is why we were convinced we had to include an Asian nation in the above roundup (though China could certainly have stood among the three).

Source: UPA Asia.

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