In today’s Finshots, we tell you why almost everyone in India is hooked on pickleball and how this craze is fuelling businesses.

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The Story

A whopping 275%!

That’s how much India’s active pickleball player count has shot up in the past three years. If you put a number to it, that’s around 60,000 players by the end of 2024. And if you count the casual ones who’ve picked up a paddle (pickleball racquet) at least once, that number easily crosses 1 lakh.

Now, five years ago, if someone said pickleball, you’d probably go, “Pickle-what?” But today, you don’t need an introduction.

Maybe you’ve heard Nikhil Kamath^# mention it often on his podcast. Or you might have seen celebrity-backed teams battling it out in India’s first and only franchise-based Pickleball League (WPBL) on Sony Sports Network. So you know that it’s a paddle sport played on an open badminton-sized court, a cusp between tennis, table tennis and badminton. And the fact that you already know this is proof that the pickleball buzz is real.

And it’s not just a fleeting trend. Startups and venture capitalists (VCs) are betting big on it, convinced that pickleball could be India’s next sporting revolution, just like IPL (Indian Premier League) was for cricket.

But what makes them so sure, you ask?

Let’s take it from the top.

You see, about a decade ago, cricket, India’s most beloved sport, bumped into an unexpected challenge ― declining viewership. The Gross Rating Points (GRP), which measure the reach of advertisements, fell from 105 in 2008 to 61 in 2014. That’s nearly a 40% drop! And it wasn’t just ODIs (One Day Internationals) or Test matches losing steam. Even the shorter and more exciting T20s showed early signs of decline. Sure, IPL was thriving, but TV wasn’t the only game in town anymore, and people had more entertainment options vying for their time. This sort of created an avenue for other alternative sports.

That same year the Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) debuted, and it was an instant hit. Nearly 435 million or 1 in 4 Indian viewers tuned in, making it the second most-watched sporting event after the IPL (which by the way had a viewership of 552 million). 

And while this didn’t directly spark pickleball’s rise, it proved that Indians were open to embracing fresh sports.

But the real boost for pickleball came during the pandemic. Public gyms were out of the question and contact sports weren’t an option. People needed an easy way to stay active. That’s when pickleball took off. Unlike badminton, tennis or squash, which required some kind of training, pickleball was simple to pick up. The rules were basic and anyone from a Gen Alpha kid to a baby boomer retiree could play it.

That was in fact, always its purpose. For context, pickleball wasn’t born out of serious athletic ambition. Back in 1965, Joel Pritchard, a US congressman, and Bill Bell, a businessman, returned home after a game of golf to find their families bored. They rummaged around for badminton equipment but couldn’t find a full set of racquets. So, they used table tennis paddles and a perforated plastic ball to improvise and come up with their own game. The goal was to create a game that the whole family could play together. And just like that, a new sport was born.

That also explains why this game gained traction even among Indians during the pandemic. Fast forward to 2022, and India hosted the Bainbridge Cup (named after pickleball’s birthplace), the first international pickleball event in the country. The prize was a staggering $50,000, which was a hefty sum for a non-professional court game!

And from then on, there was no looking back. Startups and businesses saw the potential and began capitalising on the trend.

Its appeal and simplicity wasn’t just about people being able to pick up paddles but also about how easy it was for businesses to jump in. To put things in perspective, setting up a pickleball court requires just a fraction of the investment needed for other sports like badminton. While both games need courts of similar dimensions, a pickleball court can be up and running in about ₹3-5 lakhs. That’s less than 30% of the ₹15 lakhs it takes to set up a badminton court. And in cities like Mumbai (home of Indian pickleball) and Bengaluru, where the sport is booming, businesses can recover their investment in just about three months. Factor in other costs, and it might take a little longer, but they could still churn a profit pretty quickly.

And the growth is real. According to The CapTable, India had approximately 200 operational pickleball courts in early 2024. Today, that number has surged past 1,200, with 3-4 new courts popping up every week in cities like Mumbai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Surat. And with the number of active players projected to hit 1 million by 2028 (up by a staggering 1,500%), demand for courts will only skyrocket to 2,500 courts by then.

But it’s not just about court setups. Ancillary businesses are cashing in too. Manufacturers of paddles, balls, apparel and accessories are flooding online stores. Even equipment rentals are springing up right outside courts, making it easier for newcomers to try the sport without a big upfront investment.

And this is just the beginning. If India follows the US model, the scope is even bigger. In the US, where pickleball is the fastest-growing sport, it’s not just about selling paddles online or booking courts, there are full-fledged restaurants and cafés built around the game, turning it into a social experience. Tech companies are even stepping in, creating apps that help players find courts, book lessons and organise leagues. And India isn’t far behind.

So it’s no wonder that entrepreneurs and VCs are taking notice. You might’ve seen Goodland Pickleball, a US based company, bag ₹80 lakhs in equity on Shark Tank at a ₹13 crore valuation. Or Bengaluru’s GoRally raising $750,000 from investors like Udaan’s Sujeet Kumar and Tracxn’s Abhishek Goyal.

And at this point, you might be thinking, “This sounds like the perfect startup opportunity!” But… Hold that thought because while the opportunity is exciting, there are a couple of roadblocks to consider.

For starters, breaking into the business might not be as easy down the line.

Why?

Because the sport is already thriving in urban cities, and expanding from here won’t be a walk in the park. Take Mumbai, for example. Space is a luxury here, and setting up new courts can be a logistical and financial nightmare. This means that businesses which already own a tennis court or a gym might have the upper hand. They can simply repurpose their space for pickleball, while newcomers looking to start from scratch face a much steeper climb.

And if you’re thinking, “No problem, I’ll just choose tier 2 cities or build an ancillary business around pickleball instead”, well, that comes with its own risks too. See, there’s a chance that the sport gets premiumised — kind of like golf or tennis. Some groups, especially the elite, might want to keep it exclusive rather than let it go fully mainstream. And if that happens, pickleball could shift from being an accessible, community-driven sport to a high-end experience only a select few can afford. And for businesses banking on mass adoption, that could shrink the market in ways they didn’t expect.

So yeah, the pickleball opportunity is huge. But if it ends up benefitting only a select group, be it businesses, investors or the elite, its growth could become skewed. And that kind of goes against the very idea of making pickleball a game for everyone, doesn’t it?

Until next time…

^#Zerodha, through its Rainmatter Fund, is an investor in Finshots.

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