There are three types of padel racket according to their shape: round, teardrop, and diamond, and some brands sell a fourth, the hybrid. The shape indicates where a racket usually carries its weight, but it does not decide how it plays: among the 60 rackets tested by the Testea laboratory in 2026, there are diamond rackets that hit less than some round ones.
That is why, before the silhouette, look at two pieces of data on the spec sheet: the weight and the balance.
What types of padel rackets are there?
By the shape of the head, there are three types of padel rackets: round, teardrop, and diamond. The round one has an almost circular head. The teardrop one is wider at the top, like a drop. The diamond one has the wide part even higher up and ends in a point.
Nox, in its 2025 racket catalog, adds a fourth: the hybrid, between the teardrop and the diamond. It does not have a common definition among brands.
The regulations do not regulate the shape. The racket article of the Rules of Padel of the International Padel Federation (FIP), in effect since January 1, 2026, only sets maximum dimensions: 45.5 cm long, 26 cm wide, and 38 mm thick.
Nacho, from our team: In the store, most customers associate the round racket with control and the diamond one with power. It is not an exact rule, but as a first idea it works. Almost no one asks for a hybrid by name; whoever does understands it as a middle point, just like the teardrop. In practice, the two are seen as the same.
The shape is a design decision of each brand, not a category of the regulations.
How do a round racket, a teardrop one, and a diamond one differ?
They differ above all in where they carry the weight, not in how much they weigh. This is shown by the average we calculated on the 60 rackets of the Testea Guide 2026, the guide of Testea Sport Lab, the laboratory of the ai2 institute of the Universitat Politècnica de València.
Three words from the table:
- Balance: the distance, in millimeters, from the end of the handle to the point where the racket stays in balance. The higher, the more weight the head carries.
- Manejability: how hard it is to move the racket. Testea scores it from 0 to 5, and higher is easier.
- Power: how much the racket sends the ball in fast attacking shots, like the smash. Also from 0 to 5.
| Shape | Rackets | Average weight | Average balance (from lowest to highest) | Manejability | Power |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Round | 11 | 364.8 g | 260.9 mm (249 to 269) | 4.8 | 3.4 |
| Teardrop | 24 | 363.8 g | 264.4 mm (259 to 271) | 4.3 | 3.9 |
| Diamond | 25 | 369.2 g | 270.7 mm (262 to 279) | 3.4 | 4.4 |
Average calculated by us on the Testea Guide 2026: 60 models of the 2026 season, from 13 brands, with one unit tested per model. It is not the entire market.
The round one is not the lightest: it weighs on average one gram more than the teardrop. The diamond weighs about 5 grams more than the other two. What changes the most is the balance: almost 10 millimeters more towards the head in the diamond than in the round.
No column is a border. 4 of the 11 round ones carry the balance to 265 mm or more, and 4 of the 25 diamonds leave it at 265 mm or less.
Nacho, from our team: The idea that the backhand player carries diamond and the forehand player, round, has become outdated. Each player should carry the racket with which they feel better: some like it to boost their strong points, and others, that it helps them with their weak ones.
There are clear examples in the professional circuit. Momo González plays with the Wilson Endure Pro V1, a round racket. Lamperti, one of the best hitters in the history of padel, has been with the Nox ML10 Pro Cup for many years, which changes version every season but remains very similar and quite round. My advice is to choose the racket you like, without letting yourself be carried away by the shape or by the marketing of the brands.
The silhouette gives you a clue about the balance; the real balance is only given by the spec sheet.
Does the shape matter more or the weight and balance?
The balance matters more. In the same 60 rackets of Testea, the balance explains 52 % of what varies the power from one racket to another, and being diamond, 41 %. If you already know the balance, knowing also that it is diamond only raises the explanation to 57 %. And the weight and balance together explain 80 % of the manejability.
To read the spec sheet you use the market average. A team from the Universitat Politècnica de València measured 137 commercial rackets: they weighed from 316 to 387 grams, with 363 on average, and their balance went from 246 to 283 mm, with 265.5 on average (Blanes and others, Sensors, 2022).
Not all brands publish the balance in numbers. Head gives it in millimeters; Bullpadel and Nox only say "medium" or "high", and the "high" of one brand does not compare with that of another.
Nacho, from our team: In practice, almost no one looks at the balance, because the shape already gives an idea of it. In a diamond racket it is taken for granted that the weight is higher up, and in a round one, closer to the handle. That is why, although "diamond to attack and round to control" is not an exact rule, in general it is quite fulfilled.
From the spec sheet, the weight and balance tell you more than the silhouette.
Where is the sweet spot of each shape?
In the laboratory, the position of the sweet spot does not depend on the shape; on the court, Nacho notices it a little higher in the diamond. The sweet spot is the area of the face where the shot comes out better and is barely felt in the hand. A team from the ai2 institute of the Universitat Politècnica de València located it with a robot in 225 commercial rackets. Their conclusion: measured with the robot, the position does not depend on the shape, nor on the balance, nor on the weight (Blanes and others, Sensors, 2023).
Testfakta, an independent Swedish laboratory, measured in 2022 the length of the sweet spot of 8 rackets. Two round ones gave 180 and 94 millimeters. The 8, round and teardrop, had it in the center of the face or a little lower.
Its surface in square centimeters is not published by any manufacturer or any laboratory. The closest thing is the sweet spot note of Testea, from 0 to 5: the round ones average 4.3 and the diamond ones 3.9, but in our calculation the shape explains less than 8 % of that note, and the hardness of the racket, 60 %.
Nacho, from our team: On the court I do notice that the sweet spot changes place between a round and a diamond: in the diamond it is a little higher, and in the round, more towards the center, depending on how round it is.
Another thing is how hard the racket is or how big its sweet spot is. The hardness depends on the materials: there are hard round ones and diamonds that are not so much. The size of the sweet spot depends a lot on the technology of each racket. In general, a hard diamond has the smallest sweet spot, and that is why it is associated with higher level players, who hit closer to the center.
It has always been said that a higher level racket has the smallest sweet spot, but there are exceptions. The Nox ML10 Pro Cup of Lamperti has a fairly large sweet spot, it is round and carries fiberglass faces, not carbon. And it is used by one of the backhands with the most power in history. It is a good example of how much marketing there is in what is said about rackets.
In what you feel when hitting, the hardness weighs more than the silhouette.
Is a round racket for control and a diamond one for power?
On average yes, but not always. In the 60 rackets of Testea, 6 of the 25 diamonds score 4.0 or less in power, and 3 teardrops reach 4.5. What really separates a control racket from a power one, with laboratory data, you have it in control padel rackets and power padel rackets.
The shape tells you the most likely type of play, not that of that racket.
What racket shape is best for me if I start?
The shape that is easiest to move is the round one. 9 of the 11 round ones from Testea score 4.5 or 5 in manejability. In the group of the hardest rackets to move there is no round one: the 12 are diamond.
The Testea guide proposes choosing with three questions, in this order: if you can move the racket, what are you looking for with it (precision, versatility, or attack) and how do you want to feel it when hitting. The shape is not on the list.
Nacho, from our team: For someone starting I recommend a round or intermediate racket, teardrop or hybrid. A round one usually has the largest sweet spot than a diamond one, and at the beginning the important thing is the good sensations: that the racket feels good, that getting a good shot does not cost and that it helps you.
In the store we often see the opposite case: someone who wants the racket of their favorite player, many times a backhand player with a lot of power. They buy it and do not find it comfortable, because that racket asks for a lot of precision: it has the smallest sweet spot and a little higher than a round one. To start, I would without a doubt choose a round one.
Even so, the rubber weighs as much as the shape. The beginner rackets, although some are diamond, carry a softer rubber and are much more comfortable than the high-end ones. That is why, for someone starting I recommend an affordable racket that they can use without fear: hit the wall, accidentally brush it against the ground, wear it out. They are learning new shots and they are going to do them wrong at the beginning, so the racket has to help them and take care of their elbow, their wrist, and their body. As long as it is designed for starting, with soft rubber and a wide sweet spot, the shape matters little.
You have the three shapes in padel rackets. Before the shape, ask yourself if you can move it.
What else changes between rackets, besides the shape?
The rubber and the face change. The rubber is the foam that fills the racket between its two faces. In the 60 rackets of Testea, the softer the racket is, the more vibration it absorbs and the better note it gets from the sweet spot. But the hardness does not separate the rackets that the manufacturer calls control from those it calls power.
Each brand calls its rubbers its own way, and none publishes its density or hardness in a number. On the face, the K of the carbon (3K, 12K, 18K) is the number of filaments of each strand, in thousands: a count, not a quality note.
The shape influences how hard it is to move the racket; how the shot feels depends more on the rubber.
Does the racket shape influence arm injuries?
No relationship has been found. A study with 950 amateur padel players did not find an association between the racket shape and injuries (Muñoz and others, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2022).
Nacho, from our team: Taking care of the arm weighs above all on veteran players, because many have discomfort, especially in the elbow. They usually look for a racket that generates power by itself. With a hard racket, you put the power: you have more control and more sensation with the ball, but that sensation goes straight to the elbow. If you already have discomfort, the logical thing is to look for a racket that does part of the work. For the younger ones, and for someone who is 20 or 30 years old, it usually weighs little.
For the arm, the shape is not the data that makes the difference.
Sport and Trend · Sources: the Rules of Padel of the International Padel Federation (application revision of January 1, 2026), article "The racket"; the Testea Guide 2026 of Testea Sport Lab (ai2, Universitat Politècnica de València), with the averages by shape calculated by us; Blanes and others, Sensors 22:9266 (2022) and 23:9908 (2023); the Testfakta racket test of 2022; Muñoz and others, IJERPH 19:16858 (2022); the Nox 2025 racket catalog and the spec sheets of Head, Bullpadel, and Nox. Regulations checked in the original document on October 24, 2026; studies and laboratories, on September 28, 2026.