Every week someone walks into our club in Jomtien, points at the courts and asks the same question. Is this like tennis? Is it that pickleball thing? The honest answer is that Pattaya is quietly one of the best places in Asia to try racket sports, all of them, in one trip.
This guide compares the three sports everyone asks about, padel, tennis and pickleball, then covers two more you will see around town, beach tennis and badminton. No jargon, just what each game feels like, what the gear looks like and which one makes sense for a holiday. If you want the full beginner story on padel itself, start with What is padel?
Book one padel hour. It is the fastest way to find out.
The three sports in one minute
Same family, very different personalities. Here is each game in two sentences.
The social one
Always doubles, played in a glass cage where the walls keep the ball alive. Easy to start, endlessly fun to improve, and the fastest growing sport in the world for a reason.
The classic
The biggest court, the fastest serves and the steepest learning curve. Beautiful game, but a first-timer spends most of the hour collecting balls instead of rallying.
The gentle one
A small court, a plastic ball with holes and a slow pace. You can rally within minutes, which is exactly why retirees in America made it huge.
One look at the rackets tells you the whole story
Put the five rackets side by side and each sport explains itself. A tennis racket is long and strung for power. A padel racket is short, solid and drilled with holes for control. A pickleball paddle is a flat board. A beach tennis paddle looks like padel's beach cousin. A badminton racket is a feather on a stick.
The five rackets drawn to scale. Length, surface and weight decide how each game feels in your hand.
The short, solid padel racket is the reason beginners love the sport. There is no string bed to mis-hit and no long lever to time. The ball goes roughly where you point it, from your very first rally.
Padel vs tennis vs pickleball, side by side
The numbers that actually change how each game feels.
Padel | Tennis | Pickleball | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Court | 20 × 10 m, enclosed in glass and mesh | 23.8 × 11 m doubles, open | 13.4 × 6.1 m, open |
| Racket | Solid with holes, ~45 cm, no strings | Strung, ~68 cm | Flat solid paddle, ~40 cm |
| Ball | Like a tennis ball, slightly less pressure | Pressurised felt ball | Plastic ball with holes, slow |
| Serve | Underarm, after one bounce | Overhead, the hardest shot in sport | Underarm |
| Walls | In play, like squash | None | None |
| First-day rally | Within minutes | Weeks of lessons | Within minutes |
| Holiday factor | Social, doubles, bar at the club | Tough in midday heat, solo-ish | Fun, but scene still small here |
Read the last two rows together and the holiday answer writes itself. Tennis needs weeks you do not have. Pickleball is instant fun but still a young scene in Thailand. Padel gives you the instant rally of pickleball plus the pace, the walls and the social club scene built around it.
The other two you will see in Pattaya: beach tennis and badminton
Two more rackets are part of life here, one on the sand and one in every Thai neighbourhood.
Beach tennis
Played on Jomtien beach with a perforated paddle and a low-pressure ball that must never bounce. Everything is hit on the volley over a high net. Brilliant workout, gorgeous setting, brutal in the midday sun. If you like the paddle feel, you will feel at home on a padel court.
Badminton
Thailand's everyday racket sport. Cheap indoor halls all over Pattaya, air moving, shuttles flying, locals playing at serious speed. A lovely rainy-day option and a great way to sweat with Thai regulars. The lightest racket of the five and the fastest projectile in all of sport.
Our honest take: try them all if you have the time. They train the same eye and the same footwork, and Pattaya is one of the few places where all five games live within a short drive of each other.
So which one should you pick?
Three travellers, three answers.
You want fun with friends, tonight
Padel. Four people, one glass court, rallies from the first minute and a bar ten steps away. Rackets and balls are included with every booking at Chilli Padel, so nobody needs gear.
You already play tennis at home
Padel again, seriously. Your ball sense transfers instantly, the walls add a puzzle tennis never gave you, and you will be competitive by your second session. Pattaya's public tennis courts are there when you miss the baseline.
You want the gentlest possible start
Pickleball or badminton. Both are cheap, slow-paced and easy on the body. When the rally starts feeling too easy, the padel court is where the next challenge lives.
Padel vs the rest, quick answers
Settle it on court
The comparison table is nice. An hour inside the glass is better. Book a court in Jomtien, bring three friends or let us match you with some, and find out why padel keeps stealing players from every other racket sport.