Padel 2026

Padel was invented in 1969 by Enrique Corcuera in Acapulco, Mexico, adapting elements from squash and platform tennis into a new racket sport. The game arrived in Spain in the early 1970s when Alfonso de Hohenlohe built the first European courts at the Marbella Club Hotel, and spread to Argentina shortly after.

The court measures 20m by 10m, roughly one-third the area of a tennis court, enclosed by 4-metre walls of glass and metal mesh. The net sits at 0.88m at the centre. Players use solid, stringless perforated rackets and a ball slightly smaller and less pressurized than a tennis ball. Scoring follows tennis (15, 30, 40, game, set), but two features separate padel entirely: the serve must be underarm at or below waist height, and the ball can be played off the walls after bouncing, creating squash-like rally patterns impossible on an open court. Professional padel is played exclusively as doubles.

Premier Padel launched in 2022 as the official global tour of the International Padel Federation (FIP), backed by Qatar Sports Investments (QSI). In August 2023, QSI acquired the rival World Padel Tour (WPT), merging both circuits under a unified Premier Padel structure governed by FIP.

Tournaments are ranked by three tiers. Majors carry 2,000 FIP ranking points. P1 events award 1,000 points; P2 events award 500. The season ends with the Finals in Barcelona, reserved for the highest-ranked players.

Match times vary by tournament location. European events typically run from 10:00 to 22:00 local time. A 20:00 CEST match in Madrid translates to 19:00 BST in London, 14:00 EDT in New York, and 03:00 JST (next day) in Tokyo. All times on the hub page auto-convert to your local timezone.