Pickleball planning trends
Councils received 39 pickleball applications from January to September 2026, already more than the 38 for all of 2025.
Pickleball applications since 2016
Pickleball applications in every 10,000 planning applications, over the 12 months to each month
How this is measuredFrom a single application to the highest share
The first pickleball application came in 2019. Counts stayed in single figures until 2024, when councils received 25, then 38 in 2025. Over 12 months, pickleball's share of applications is now nearly 9 times its level three years earlier, the highest since 2016.
Spread thinly, led by the South East
The South East had 18 of the 70 applications from 2023 to 2025, ahead of London on 11. Applications are widely scattered: no council has received more than three since 2016.
Q3 2026 against a year earlier
Councils received 14 pickleball applications in Q3 2026, too few to compare their share with a year earlier.
Pickleball applications each quarter
14 in Q3 2026, against 15 a year earlier.
Out of every 10,000 applications
As a share of every application: 1.4 in every 10,000 in Q3 2026, against 1.4 a year earlier.
Latest pickleball applications
- Sidcup Family Golf, Sidcup by Pass Road, Chislehurst Part demolition of existing driving range and adventure golf buildings and erection of part single-, part two-storey extension, 4 x covered padel courts and 3 x external pickleball courts, with extensive landscaping and ancillary works.
- Westlode Street Spalding Redevelopment of part of the existing car park to provide a dedicated and covered padel and pickleball facility including clubhouse pavilion, car parking and associated works
- Waterman Square, Selsdon Way, Canary Wharf, London E14 Construction of a pickleball court and pavilion at Waterman Square.
- Wantage Lawn Tennis Club, Memorial Park, Manor Road, Wantage Two uncovered Padel courts and one Pickleball court to replace one existing tarmac tennis court to an existing established tennis club. New chain link fencing to match existing fencing. Relocation of two existing floodlight columns.
- Land off Bourne Road Spalding Proposed racquet sports centre (Padel, Pickleball and Badminton) with associated infrastructure and car parking
- Onley Grounds Equestrian Complex Limited Onley Grounds Farm London Road Barby Change of use of an existing indoor equestrian arena to a mixed-use indoor sports, fitness and recreation facility, including padel and pickleball courts, gym facilities, children's recreation and associated community uses.
Questions
How many pickleball planning applications are there in the UK?
Councils have received 120 since January 2016, 53 of them in the 12 months to September 2026. Their share peaked in the 12 months to June 2026.
Which councils get the most pickleball applications?
Dorset, Horsham and Leeds have received the most since 2016.
When did pickleball first appear in UK planning applications?
The first application came in 2019. Councils received 1 in 2019, 3 in 2021, 1 in 2022 and 7 in 2023, before the count rose to 25 in 2024 and 38 in 2025.
Are pickleball applications still rising?
Yes. Councils received 53 in the 12 months to September 2026, the highest share since 2016, and the 39 from January to September 2026 already exceed the 38 in all of 2025.
About Plota
Plota is the UK's most visited planning search, according to Similarweb. It shows every new planning application from every UK council, read daily from 390 planning registers, with past applications back to 2016 from more than 420 registers, including those of councils since merged. It also covers planning committee decisions, HMO licences and premises licences.
How this is measured
What needs an application
Councils have received 120 pickleball applications since 2016, most of them since 2024.
Methodology
- What is counted: planning applications to UK councils whose description names pickleball or a close variant of the words, by the date each council received them. These are planning applications, not completed schemes; the largest energy and infrastructure projects are consented nationally rather than by councils, so they sit outside these counts.
- How matches are checked: we read the 200 most recent pickleball applications and 20 from every year since 2016 to confirm each one belongs.
- Topic counts leave out, by design, works to trees and applications that only discharge conditions, amend an earlier permission or approve reserved matters, which follow a scheme already counted. Everything else is counted.
- A share is the number out of every 10,000 applications over the previous 12 months. Each topic is a number in every 10,000 planning applications, so trends compare when overall planning activity changes; the share still moves when either the topic's count or the total does. This topic has no planning index: councils received fewer than 20 in 2016, too few to measure change against.
- Source: the planning registers of every UK council, January 2016 to September 2026, read on 9 November 2026.
- Planning is seasonal, so each quarter is compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
- Year on year: each topic's and theme's share of all applications in Q3 2026, against Q3 2025, at every council we hold. A share is the number in every 10,000 applications. Shares compare across councils and years; raw counts do not.
- Left out of the topic shares: Birmingham's applications from June to September 2026: a validation backlog at the council since June 2026: of 685 reference numbers it issued in September, its register lists 288. The same months a year earlier are left out too, so every comparison covers the same councils.
- Download the data (CSV): every topic and theme, each quarter since 2016.