Pickleball paddles have changed. A lot.

It’s hard to believe that only three years ago we hadn’t heard of a carbon top sheet, and we’d never even scratched the surface of thermoforming. The reality is that things are moving fast, so it’s worth taking a moment to explain what kind of tech all the expensive top-end paddles feature these days.

We’re going to cover a lot of technologies today, so to keep this digestible, we won’t dive too deeply into the science behind each one. Instead, we’ll emphasize how they affect playability—what you should expect in terms of feel, power, control, and spin.

We’re going to cover thermoforming, Kevlar, Ronbus’ Edge Grid, titanium, and foam cores, in that order. So feel free to skip to a specific section if you’re more interested in just that.

Thermoforming

The major technological change that enabled all these new developments is thermoforming.

We were a little late to the thermoforming train, but once we brought in the first few paddles, it was obvious this had completely revolutionized the sport.

Thermoforming refers to the heat molding process used to press all the pieces of a pickleball paddle together. Before thermoforming, companies used to glue the pieces, leaving imperfections and gaps that resulted in paddles flawed in both playability and durability.

As soon as we hit a few balls with our first thermoformed paddles, we realized the massive jump in playability that had just been created. The molding process creates a rigid, seamless feel—basically, the paddle is able to maintain more of the ball’s energy during contact. Spin and power were the most instantly obvious benefits, but the more we played with these paddles, the more we realized there was more to it.

Sweet spot size: The rigid feel of a thermoformed paddle makes for a significantly bigger sweet spot. All parts of the paddle remain more solid on contact, so if you do hit the ball outside of the optimal hitting zone, you still get close to perfect playability. With non-thermoformed paddles, it often felt like the feel, power, and spin potential would completely collapse if you weren’t making perfect contact.

Ball feel: This benefit was subtle at first, mostly because feel is subjective, but the more we played with thermoformed paddles, the more we realized that they provide a much better connection to the ball. There are no gaps or seams in the paddle’s construction for vibrations to be lost; vibrations turn into feedback, which is what we call “feel.”

These are some of our favourite thermoformed paddles:

   

Thermoforming was the real catalyst for change in paddle construction. Almost every playability characteristic improved, except for a very important one: control. Because of their inherent rigidity, thermoformed paddles don’t cushion the ball very much, which makes them more difficult to control. Brands quickly realized this and started looking for ways to make them perform better in the soft game; enter Kevlar.

Kevlar

Before the Kevlar top sheet, there was carbon. It’s been around for so long that I won’t spend too much time on it, but, of course, it completely changed the power and spin game. The slight issue with carbon is that its playability is very linear. When it’s soft, it’s soft, and when it’s stiff, it’s stiff; it doesn’t matter how you swing. Thermoforming makes carbon play stiff, and while a lot of players like this, some obviously look for more variety.

Kevlar has a unique “adaptive” characteristic that carbon doesn’t have. Again, I won’t get into the science, but when you make light contact with Kevlar, it feels plush, and as you hit it harder, it firms up. Translated to the pickleball court, that means good soft control and power when you’re looking for it. That sounds pretty much perfect, and it’s not far from it, but keep in mind that these differences are much more subtle than you may expect.

 

 

Of course, the better you get, the more you’ll start to understand those subtleties, and that’s why a lot of high-level players appreciate the playability of Kevlar paddles. The Honolulu Pickleball J2K and SixZero Ruby are two of our favorites and have become extremely popular over the last several months.

Ronbus’ Grid Pattern Technology

While a lot of companies went with Kevlar to add that dynamic playability, Ronbus went in another direction. They kept the carbon top sheet but redesigned the thermoformed bonding method, starting around the edges of the paddle. This is the Grid Pattern Technology we see in the R1 and R3 Nova. Instead of a raw sheet outlining the sides of the paddle, they molded it into a grid, which creates space between the carbon for a much more flexible feel.

 

Like Kevlar, it’s softer when you’re making light contact, but because it’s still unibody, it firms up as you hit harder. Is it better than Kevlar? Not necessarily, but there is a wider range to the dynamic feel. It’s softer when it’s soft and slightly firmer when it’s firm. I was a huge fan of the Novas when they first came out, and then Ronbus spread the technology to the rest of the paddle.

As I mentioned earlier, the Grid Pattern is only on the edges of the Nova. On the Pulsar FX series, Ronbus added that grid to the layer of carbon under the top sheet. As you can imagine, this amplifies the dynamic feel, but especially the softness. The R1, R2, and R3 Pulsar FX are some of the softest thermoformed paddles out there right now, and they are only slightly less powerful than the Novas and their Kevlar competition.

   

Titanium

Titanium hasn’t hit the mainstream yet, at least not in the same way that Kevlar and carbon have, but in principle, it is very similar. Titanium is another super-material that can firm up as you hit harder, but there are a few differences to note compared to the materials we just mentioned.

Whereas Kevlar provides a very plush, rich feel for the ball, titanium softens up the contact in a more muted way. It’s not quite as soft as Kevlar, but it still gives you much more margin to grab and guide the ball than what you get on a traditional carbon, thermoformed paddle.

It also firms up to crush the ball harder, but that muted feel stops it from generating the same power and spin potential that Kevlar can. While that might make it slightly less competitive in terms of top-end performance, that muted feel is something that a lot of players love in a pickleball paddle. It makes the paddle more forgiving as it creates a more homogeneous feel around the paddle face.

 

 

Time will tell whether titanium becomes as popular as Kevlar. Right now, only Bread & Butter uses it woven with carbon on the Shogun, but that paddle is selling like hotcakes, so it’s just a matter of time before other companies follow suit.

Foam

We’ve made our way to foam: the pickleball controversy of the century. Why is it so controversial? Mostly because the biggest paddle company’s biggest-ever paddle was made illegal less than a month after it was released. The Gen 3 Joolas had detached foam cores (Propulsion Cores), and the playability that came with them was astonishing. Foam is soft, but if engineered properly, it can also be springy, and Joola certainly engineered it properly. The Gen 3 Joolas were the most powerful paddles I ever tested; when you swung full, or flicked hard at a volley, the ball came off with a ridiculous amount of velocity.

Unfortunately, it was a little too ridiculous because that power led to their demise; they were illegally powerful. The USAPA banned the use of Gen 3 Joolas, and eventually the Vatic Pro Oni (similarly constructed), in tournaments, and that was the end of that.

 

 

It wasn’t just their power that was impressive, though; they were also soft, so as long as you weren’t triggering that spring effect, they were very good in the control game. Of course, one wrong move and you were sending the ball to the moon, but once high-level players mastered that transition point from soft to springy, they were elite in all facets of play.

I completely understand the need for regulation, at least to keep technological developments methodical rather than always revolutionary, but foam is one that has to make a comeback sooner rather than later. When used properly, foam paddles do feel a bit like a cheat code, but they’re hard to use properly, and that should be reason enough to keep them around because it means not everyone will use them.

The Gearbox Pro Power series is still legal and a very good foam-cored paddle. It doesn’t have the same top-end power as the Gen 3 Joolas but provides a similarly unique feel and is one of our favorite paddles right now.

 

That’s it for the tech! This article could very well be obsolete in a year; in fact, I hope it is! There’s nothing like testing the latest and greatest technologies, and we hope pickleball keeps developing as quickly as it has been over the last several years.

If you want to try any of the paddles we mentioned in this article, or any paddle in general, we have a fantastic demo program for you. And of course, you can also check them all out online.