Padel is leaving London. I've spent the last few weeks looking at where it's going, what it costs, and what nobody is really saying about it.
A few weeks ago I mapped the price of every padel court in London. 61 clubs. £20 to £100 an hour. The post went bigger than I expected, and the comment I got most was a version of the same thing: but what about outside London?
So I did the South-East next. 64 clubs across Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Hampshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Oxfordshire. Same verification approach. Same cheat sheet format.
What I found is more interesting than another pricing list. The South-East isn't a smaller, cheaper version of London padel. It's a different sport, growing faster, in places the industry isn't really talking about.
Here's what I think is going on.
Cost: it really is cheaper, and not in the way people assume
The South-East average is about £34 an hour. London's is £47. Split four ways, that's £8.50 a head outside London versus £12 inside it. Over a weekly habit that's roughly £180 a year.
That's the easy stat. The more interesting one is the spread.
London padel: £20 to £100 — a 5x ratio
SE padel: £18 to £70 — a 4x ratio, lower ceiling
Cheapest SE court: Padel People Sedlescombe (Sussex), £18/hr off-peak
Most expensive SE court: PADELHUB Reading, £70/hr
What this actually means: the SE has a real middle. London skews bimodal. You play at a £24 park court or a £70 lifestyle club. Not much in between. The SE is full of £30–£45 clubs that don't really exist in central London — solid indoor venues with a café and a bar, no cold plunge, no membership tier, just padel.
That middle is where most regular players actually want to be. It's the bit London doesn't really have.
The South-East cheat sheet
All 64 clubs, postcodes, price ranges and booking apps across the eight counties. Save these. Send them to the friend who keeps asking where to play.
Where it's growing: not where most people think
I went in expecting to map a thinner version of the London scene. Instead I counted 64 clubs to London's 61.
The commuter belt has caught up to the capital on supply. And it's done it almost entirely in the last 24 months.
Padel4all has opened in Bracknell, Eastbourne and Fareham. PadelStars has rolled out Reading, Bracknell, St Albans, Guildford and Southampton. New independents — Padel Vault in Milton Keynes, Square One in Ashford, the Padel Tree sites in Bushey — have added real capacity. There are 18 padel clubs within a St Albans postcode search radius. There were three two years ago.
Eighteen months ago I'd have told you the next wave of UK padel was going to be more premium clubs in Zone 1. That answer was wrong. The growth is in places like Bushey, Bracknell, Fareham, Sevenoaks and Ashford. Towns nobody in the London padel scene is paying attention to.
If you're building, investing or operating in this space, that should change how you're thinking about the next three years.
Vibe: the bit the price data doesn't capture
This is the part I want to talk about, because it's the bit nobody is really saying.
London padel is a status sport. You feel it the moment you walk in. Glass walls, branded apparel in the pro shop, lifestyle photography on the walls, a cold plunge somewhere, an espresso menu, a member tier system. It's brilliant when it's done well. The best London clubs are genuinely beautiful spaces and the experience is real.
But it's selling padel as an identity, not just a sport.
Outside London, padel feels different. Marden Sports Club in rural Kent is pay-and-play, no membership, post-game pint at the clubhouse bar. West Worthing Club is a not-for-profit member club that opened its courts to the public. Berko Padel is two outdoor courts at a hockey club in Tring. Padel People Sedlescombe is a golf club that added padel.
None of this is Instagrammable in the same way. There's no merch line. The cafés serve filter coffee. The staff know everyone's name. People who play there have been playing there for two years and they know each other's kids.
This isn't a value judgement. The premium model has its place and the best premium clubs in London are world-class. But the community model is doing something the premium model can't, which is building actual padel habit in people who weren't already converted. The status model gets people to upgrade once they're hooked. The community model is the bit that gets them hooked.
I think this matters because of where padel goes next. The honest version of the growth question is: who is padel actually for? Right now in London, the answer skews towards people who can comfortably absorb £20–£25 a head, multiple times a week, plus the kit. That's a real audience but it's a ceiling. The community-led venues in the South-East are quietly proving there's a much bigger audience underneath that — if you build for them.
Hotel and country club padel: the quietest trend in UK racket sports
Roughly fifteen percent of the SE venues I mapped are attached to a country club, hotel or destination leisure property. Trevose, Elcot Park, New Place Hotel, Down Hall, Champneys Tring, Bamford, Daylesford and Bannatyne's Weybridge all sit in this category.
This barely exists in London. There aren't the country estates to support it. In the SE it's emerging as its own sub-category, with pricing in the £28–£40 range, often bundled with spa, restaurant or hotel-stay access.
It's also the most replicable model nationally. Every market town with a half-decent country club or hotel grounds is a candidate. I'd expect this to be the biggest growth category in UK padel over the next 18 months, and most of the industry conversation isn't even mentioning it.
The booking app problem is worse outside London
In the London piece I flagged eight different booking systems as a friction point. The SE has more.
Across 64 clubs you'll find Playtomic, MATCHi, Padel Mates, Playskan, Nettla, ClubSpark, Padel4all's own app, PadelStars' own app, Sevenoaks Padel's own app, Square One's own system, plus various Direct-via-venue setups.
The chains are increasingly building their own apps. Good for them. Harder for players. Every new app is another barrier between someone curious about padel and actually playing it.
If anyone reading this is thinking about building infrastructure in UK padel: an aggregator that surfaces availability across systems is the single biggest unbuilt thing in this market. Playskan is doing good work but coverage is patchy. There's space.
The full data table
Prefer text to images? All 64 clubs, grouped by county.
| Club | Postcode | Min p/h | Max p/h | Booking |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Surrey | ||||
| CourtFit Cobham | KT11 1EW | £28 | £44 | Playtomic |
| Esher Tennis & Padel | KT10 9DU | Member | Member | Member-only |
| Weybridge Padel Club | KT13 8QA | £24 | £28 | Direct |
| Surrey Sports Park (PadelStars) | GU2 7AD | £32 | £48 | Playtomic * |
| PadelStars Guildford | GU area | £32 | £48 | PadelStars app |
| Hampton Court Padel | KT8 area | £30 | £50 | Playtomic * |
| Pure Padel Lightwater | GU18 area | £32 | £44 | Playtomic * |
| Worplesdon Tennis Club | GU3 area | £24 | £32 | ClubSpark * |
| Ashtead Squash & Tennis | KT21 area | Member | Member | Member-only |
| Purley Sports Club | CR8 area | £40 | £50 | Direct |
| Reigate Priory Padel | RH2 area | £28 | £36 | Direct * |
| Banstead Padel | SM7 area | £24 | £32 | Direct * |
| Sussex | ||||
| Game4Padel Withdean Brighton | BN1 5JF | £20 | £30 | MATCHi |
| West Worthing Club | BN11 area | £20 | £36 | Direct |
| Padel Project Worthing | BN16 area | £24 | £32 | Direct |
| Padel People Sedlescombe | TN33 0SD | £18 | £28 | Playtomic |
| Padel4all Eastbourne (Saffrons) | BN21 4UH | £24 | £44 | P4all direct |
| Break Point Coaching Eastbourne | BN21 area | £18 | £28 | Playtomic |
| The Padel Club Brighton | BN1 area | N/A | N/A | Playtomic * |
| Eastbourne Padel Club | BN21 area | £24 | £36 | Playtomic |
| Cuckfield Padel | RH17 area | £24 | £32 | Direct * |
| Kent | ||||
| Square One Ashford | TN23 4TU | £20 | £44 | Playtomic |
| Square One Sittingbourne | ME10 area | £20 | £44 | Playtomic * |
| PADELHUB TN2 Tunbridge Wells | TN2 3EF | £40 | £60 | Playtomic |
| Hollybush Padel Sevenoaks | TN13 3XN | £32 | £32 | ClubSpark |
| Sevenoaks Padel (Polhill) | TN14 area | £24 | £36 | Sevenoaks app |
| Brakepoint Canterbury | CT1 3RA | £40 | £58 | Playtomic |
| Play Padel Club Deal | CT14 9AL | £24 | £40 | Playtomic |
| Tour Padel Medway Campus | ME4 area | £24 | £36 | Playtomic * |
| Marden Sports Club | TN12 area | £20 | £28 | Playtomic |
| Tonbridge Golf Centre | TN10 area | £24 | £32 | Direct * |
| Forever Padel (Maidstone) | ME17 area | N/A | N/A | Playtomic * |
| Hampshire | ||||
| Padel Hub Southampton | SO16 0AS | £24 | £40 | Playtomic * |
| PadelStars Southampton | SO area | £32 | £48 | PadelStars app |
| Winchester Racquets & Fitness | SO22 6AN | Member | Member | Member-only |
| Padel United New Place Hotel | SO32 area | £24 | £36 | Direct |
| Padel4all Fareham | PO15 area | £24 | £40 | P4all direct |
| Padel People Basingstoke | RG23 8PE | £24 | £36 | Playtomic |
| Manydown Tennis & Padel | RG23 area | £24 | £32 | ClubSpark * |
| Bordon Padel Club | GU35 9HG | £24 | £32 | Direct * |
| Berkshire | ||||
| PADELHUB RG1 Reading | RG1 3DH | £50 | £70 | Playtomic |
| PadelStars Reading (Berks CSC) | RG4 6ST | £32 | £48 | PadelStars app |
| Padel4all Bracknell | RG12 area | £24 | £40 | P4all direct |
| PadelStars Bracknell (Binfield) | RG42 4EX | £28 | £44 | PadelStars app |
| Padel Berkshire Maidenhead | SL6 area | £28 | £44 | Direct |
| Courts Padel Elcot Park | RG20 area | £40 | £60 | Playtomic |
| Slough Padel (Eton/Wexham) | SL2 5DT | £24 | £36 | Direct * |
| David Lloyd Royal Berkshire | RG12 area | Member | Member | DL app |
| Buckinghamshire | ||||
| Padel Vault Milton Keynes | MK area | £32 | £60 | Playtomic |
| David Lloyd Milton Keynes | MK area | Member | Member | DL app |
| Marvel Padel MK | MK area | £28 | £40 | Playtomic * |
| Padel MK Stantonbury | MK14 6DT | £30 | £30 | Playtomic |
| UK Padel South Bucks | SL area | £24 | £32 | MATCHi * |
| Holmer Green Padel | HP15 area | £24 | £32 | Direct * |
| Champneys Tring | HP23 6XH | Guest | Guest | Guest-only |
| Hertfordshire | ||||
| PadelStars St Albans | AL3 5XA | £38 | £44 | MATCHi |
| Padel Tree @ Metropolitan Bushey | WD23 2TR | £30 | £40 | Playtomic |
| Padel Tree @ Hertfordshire | AL area | £28 | £40 | Playtomic * |
| Berko Padel (Berkhamsted) | HP23 5RF | £24 | £32 | Direct |
| Bishops Stortford LTC | CM23 2TD | £20 | £28 | Direct |
| Country Padel Co (Ware) | SG11 1EF | £28 | £36 | MATCHi |
| G4P Gosling Welwyn GC | AL8 6XE | £28 | £40 | MATCHi |
| Oxfordshire | ||||
| Oxford Padel Club | OX area | £28 | £40 | Playtomic * |
| Bicester Padel | OX26 area | £24 | £36 | Playtomic * |
* = approximate or verify direct with the club. N/A = pricing not publicly listed at time of writing.
What I'm taking from all this
A few honest things.
The growth ceiling for premium central London padel is closer than the industry is admitting. London will absorb more clubs, but the unit economics are getting harder. The operators extending into the commuter belt look more strategically positioned than the ones doubling down on Zone 1.
The thesis that padel will follow tennis and end up as a mostly premium urban sport doesn't match what I'm seeing in the SE data. Padel is becoming the opposite of premium urban tennis. More community sports trusts. More converted squash courts. More hotel tie-ins. More towns that don't currently appear in any padel-industry conversation.
The next two years of interesting venues are going to be in Worthing. Tring. Maidstone. Bracknell. Bushey. Sevenoaks. Watch them.
And if the question is how do we keep growing this sport — the SE data has a pretty clear answer. You build cheaper. You build closer to where people live. You build with a clubhouse bar instead of a cold plunge. You let people in without a membership. You make the route to court shorter and friendlier than it currently is.
The premium urban model has done its job. It's put padel on the map and proved the demand. The next chapter is going to be written by the community-led venues in towns most of London has never been to.
Operate a SE club I should know about? Played somewhere I've missed? Drop me a DM on @padelhud →
What's next in the series
- Series 3: South-West England — Bristol, Bath, Exeter, Cornwall, Dorset. Already mapped.
- Series 4: The Midlands — Birmingham, Nottingham, Leicester. The fastest-growing padel region in the UK right now.
- Series 5: The North — Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield, Newcastle.
- Series 6: Scotland and Wales.
- Series 7: Ireland.
Prices verified across public listings and official club sites in April 2026. Padel pricing changes frequently — always confirm at the point of booking. Entries marked with an asterisk are approximate, taken from secondary sources, or relate to newer venues whose pricing may have moved. Member-only and Guest-only venues don't publish hourly rates.
