Pickleball in France: FFT Takes the Lead

The tennis and badminton federations competed for the pickleball delegation. The FTT announced on Friday that it had won the mission to organize the practice in France.

A racket sport combining “elements of tennis, padel, badminton and table tennis” and playing “on a badminton court”. The very definition of pickleball suggested that it would attract the attention of several federations. It was finally the French Tennis Federation, which announced, Friday January 2, that it had obtained the delegation of this young discipline from the Ministry of Sports. The FFT now has the “official responsibility to organize the practice in France”.

“This young and dynamic sport corresponds perfectly to our ambition to diversify the disciplines offered within our 7,000 clubs,” welcomed Gilles Moretton, president of the FFT. In its press release, the Federation claims the presence “nearly 30,000 practitioners” pickleball in France for 3,500 licenses, almost half of which are women.

“To date, 850 clubs offer pickleball, whose courts are easy to install on a tennis court,” ensures the FFT. The latter intends to develop pickleball, by continuing “the deployment of discipline in clubs” while also structuring “the high level sector” and organizing official competitions. She will also participate “the definition and application of the rules governing the discipline”.

The FFT had included in these statutes from 2024 this sport which can be played in doubles or singles, indoors or outdoors and which appeared in France in 2015. In March 2025, the French Badminton Federation for its part announced a partnership with the Pickleball France Federation with the aim of obtaining the delegation of this discipline born in the United States in 1965.