5 Ultimate All-Court Pickleball Paddles, Based on Lab Data

The team at JustPaddles crunched some key metrics to find the sweet-spot in performance across all three zones of the court

All-court is all the rage right now.

The power phase was fun. But more and more, rec players are discovering that feel trumps firepower nine times out of 10. The game is just more fun when you're not blasting every shot 10 feet past the opposing baseline.

But what does all-court even mean, really? It's a fair question.

Performance ultimately comes down to individual player perception – I might think a paddle hits super hard, you mind find it more muted. Plush to me might feel somewhat stiff to you. You get the idea.

But when it comes to a paddle that performs universally across all three zones of the court, a few factors become undeniable.

Thankfully, the team at Kansas City-based JustPaddles built their in-house testing lab (aptly named Paddle Lab) to bring objective, measurable performance data into a space long dominated by opinion and conjecture.

We asked them to crunch the numbers across the 500+ paddles in their database, focusing on a few key metrics:

• Swing weight indicates to players how heavy the paddle feels during actual play, with higher values signifying a paddle that requires more effort to swing but may deliver more power
• Twist weight reveals how stable the paddle remains during off-center impacts, with higher twist weight values reflecting better resistance to twisting and, therefore, more forgiveness for less-than-perfect ball hits
• Exit velocity is a more accurate representation of the paddle's true power potential based on rebound speeds off a ball shot from a cannon at 60 mph combined with a 25 mph swing speed

To find the ultimate all-court paddle, JustPaddles focused on below average swing weights, above average twist weights, and an exit velocity calibrated between 38 and 42 mph.

This is far from an exhaustive list, of course, but these five paddles represent the sweet-spot in performance for anyone looking for the best of all worlds.

1. Franklin Aurelius
2. Friday Aura
3. Honolulu J2CR
4. Selkirk Omni
5. Six Zero Coral Pro

Use code THEDINK for a discount at checkout on all applicable paddles

More from the Paddle Lab:

Heads up: hundreds of thousands of pickleballers read our free newsletter. Subscribe here for cutting edge strategy, insider news, pro analysis, the latest product innovations and more.