Introduction:

I was fascinated when I heard about the richest pickleball player, Ben Johns, who makes at least 2.5 million dollars in 2022-23. And surprisingly, he is only 25 years old! As a pro pickler for the last 10-12 years, I can predict, this game has a bright future with many superstar players! 

I was 17 when I earned my first income of 500 USD through this game. I won a regional competition in Florida, ‘ Cypress Cove Pickleball Fun Tournament’! I was in clouds of happiness and proud of that victory. Apart from my love for computers and machines, this success was very close to my heart. 

I have created this article for emerging players who see this game as their career or source of income. I have covered the approximate earrings of pro picklers, their various sources of monetary delights, and predictions about this game’s future below. Keep reading to learn more about it below!

What are the earnings of professional players in this game?

First, we need to understand the meaning of a professional player for this game. There are two kinds of players in this game:

1. Pro Touring Players:  These players can participate in legal tournaments. They get paid with a definite incentive for playing in a specific number of tournaments.
2. Pro-Division Players: These players must have higher ratings. They also need to pay more participating fees than other competitions. I like to play in these divisions more than tours because it has dual benefits. 

I get to win the prize money for winning the matches and I also get to compete with the best and high-skilled players. 

If you want to know your rating for this game, kindly refer to this Guide for details.

Each legal and professional competition of this game has a reward prize. Studies say that one average pro pickler makes 50,000 USD/ year. According to the USAPA Facts sheet in 2023, the pro players in the USA Pickleball National Championships that was conducted at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden, Margaritaville- competed for $150,000 in prize money among 2,300 registered players.

Well, I feel this prize money amount differs from season, region, tournament type, and difficulty level. Let’s look into the approximate earrings of professional players for this game.

image data source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqRBaJA34n8&t=1s

1. Tournaments 
   

   This is the most basic and primary source of earning for many pro picklers. Studies say that 150 official tournaments are held every year in the States. If you have the potential skills to ace this game, you can sooner earn worthy monetary delights by winning matches.
   There is a lot of scope and a bright future in this game. More audiences and participation help the organizers to collect more money for a match. The plus point is that its popularity and craze enable the match organizers to allocate bigger and multiplied reward money.
   There are some major competitions through which players can participate and win rewards: 

   The PPA Tour:

   The earnings in PPA tours are magnificent. There are three major PPA competitions: the PPA Tour, the PPA Cup, and the PPA Open.
   As per 2024 reports, for PPA Tours, the winner of the doubles finals gets the reward of $ 10,000 for both the men’s and women’s teams. However, the singles match winner gets $3750 for both male and female categories. The total reward budget for PPA tours in 2024 was $1,195,260! Isn’t that wonderful if you leverage your skills and get a chance to win such a victorious competition!
   Similar to the PPA Tour, the PPA cup matches also have rewards with a total budget of $1,183,298 in 2024. The winner in men’s, women’s, and doubles would get the prize of $9000! And, men’s-women’s singles would get $3300! If you feel you can beat those players and have ideal ratings, you can participate in these matches.
   Finally, comes the famous PPA Open competition, which is easier to play than the previous two and has rewards of $1,171,322! The winners of men, women, and mixed matches get $8,000. However, singles winners get $2960!
   Apart from these, the Senior Pros also win specific rewards for winning matches. Their total payout is calculated by:
   Overall Rewards=  ( Total number of players in a division) ✖ (the event fee)✖  52.5/100
   Where the winner gets 55% money from overall prize rewards. The second-place winner gets 30% and the third-place player gets 15% of the overall prize rewards.
   Don’t forget to note that, the players also get appearance fees and stipends for these matches! That is like an additional source of income along with winner-prize money.
   

   The APP Tour
   

   The APP matches have their schedule and rewards. APP is hosting 12 main tournaments in 2024:  four APP Tour Majors and eight APP Tour Primary tournaments.
   The APP Majors have a prize money of f $150,000 per event, which is three times than in 2023. However,  the APP Praimary tournaments have doubled the reward amounts in 2024 as compared to 2023. These matches will pay  $100,000 per event at least!
   

   The MLP
   

   MLPs have teams of top-performing players to compete with each other. According to 2022, reports, the winning team got a $100,000 Prize. It means that each player got $25,000 at least for winning the finals.
   In 2023, 96 players are participated. They were divided into different teams across 6 events at the Premier and Challenger Levels! LeBron has invested in the MLP and the winning team prize is  5 million dollars!
   How much money can you make from professional pickleball?
   So, you can get an idea of how much potential this game holds in the future. Because the rewards are increasing year by year as its popularity is enhancing! If you are a pro player and want to hit a jackpot with your competing skills, you can initiate to participate in MLPs.

2. Endorsements:

   Apart from tournaments, professional and successful players also get endorsements and sponsorships for brands. Any sports-related brand of equipments to clothe, that relates to this game can give endorsements. If a specific player has a striking fan following and crazy popularity among audiences, he can easily get sponsorships starting from 5K USD.
   It also depends on the type of product provided by the company. If the company manufactures good quality equipment like paddles, players get invited to advertise the specific product from the brand.On average, players earn more than 50,0000 USD per month on long-term contracts and deals. These monetary terms vary from player to player based on his performance and fame.
   The most popular pickleball player, Ben Johns signed the first sponsorship deal of his life with Franklin Sports in 2019 for three years. Later, he signed a lifetime partnership and collaboration contract with the JOOLA Pickleball.
   Ben collaborated with them to design and develop the most iconic JOOLA Ben Johns Hyperion CFS 16 pickleball paddle. This paddle has become world-famous and a favorite among pro players, including me!
   Top female player Anna Leigh has an overall income of 1 million USD. She has notable sponsorships of  Paddletek, LOCK LACES®, Dynasty Financial Partners, Studio Margaret, FILA, and Carvana (with a brand new Range Rover!

    

3. Personal Coaching:

   This is also an easy and simple way of earning money for pro players. After the age of 35 or 40, many pro picklers turn to coaching and clinic camps to train newbies to enhance their chances of winning legal tournaments.
   They charge on an hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly basis. The caching fees depend on the popularity and style of training of the coach. Famous players named Tyson McGuffin and Kyle McKenzie run a coaching camp facility. You can enroll in it from TM Signature PB Camp. He charges $849/person for the daily camp of 6 hrs. They also have a two-day camp facility charging $475/ person per day.
   If you opt for private coaching, coaches at least charge  $40 to $75 per hour. However, for group coaching, they charge $20 to $40 per hour per person. So, if you are an experienced pickler and want to help new players along with some cash benefits, coaching, and clinics can work for you excellently!

    

4. Officiating as a referee:

   Well, the earnings might be low in this case. Officiating a match pays 5-10 USD per game to referees. One referee can officiate 15-20 matches within a day. So on average, he makes 150- 200 USD per day.  A legal referee has meal expenses and allowance facilities covered from the USAPA.
   If someone really wants to lead the competing players on the right track without worrying much about the pay, he can opt to officiate as a referee. But, obviously, you need to be a certified referee before officiating in official tournaments from PPA, APP, etc.
   If you are also one of those who has a desire to become a referee, you can read this guide on becoming a referee for this game!

image data source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqRBaJA34n8&t=1s

 Other sources of earning money for pro picklers:

1. Social Appearance:

   Making a seven-figure salary needs patience and consistent performance. In my days of performing like a star, I got was invited to a social event of a local shoe brand of sports. The sponsors gifted me $700 for coming and giving my two cents to teenagers who want to become pros in this game! It was such a nostalgic memory of my journey.
   Some famous players get paid for appearing at social events, meet and greets, and club matches. They join as a guest of honor or chief guest at community gatherings, club annual events, etc.
   Doing this helps players in two ways:
   – Helping and spreading awareness about this brilliant game in the pickleball community, especially among teenagers.
   – Earn money as a side income in addition to their main tournament prize rewards and sponsorships.
   

2. Media:

   Professional players also get to be involved in media press relations for advertising, speeches, club events, community gatherings, etc. These players get a massive following on their social media handles like X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc.
   Such popular players can create respective social media pages and promote awareness about the game, new products, brand sponsorships, etc. They get paid as sports influencers from big brands and advertising companies for these social media campaigns.
   Some players launch their websites to add value-filled info and quality sports equipment information. They earn via affiliate blogs and guest posts.
   Some experienced picklers start their YouTube channel to guide new players about updated rules, online coaching, meet-ups, interviews, etc. They earn via YouTube ads, affiliate income, and paid interviews.

3. Merchandising their brand:

   Some successful picklers develop and create their sportswear brand to launch their merchandise, pickleball equipment brand, etc. E.g. Most popular John Ben launched his JOOLA Ben Hyperion paddle by partnering with JOOLA sports!
   They know the pros and cons of sports equipment as they use these paddles, balls, shoes, etc. especially to fulfill the needs of this game.
   A player can research and design a value-added and good-quality paddle or ball. It can help the sports community with an uplifted game quality and the player who launches that merchandise also gets benefited monetarily.
   The potential of merchandising personalized pickleball T-shirts, paddles, shoes, etc. with the player’s name on it is huge! As e-commerce is booming after COVID, you can opt for this way of earning income if you have a good fan-base!
   

   For more details about pro picklers’ earning estimates, kindly watch the following video:

    

Who are the highest-paid pro pickleball players?

Some top players are an inspiration to me because of their star-like performance and unbeatable skills. Here’s the list of some highest-paid pro players:

• Ben Johns: He is 25 and makes $42,00,0000/ year.
  
• Anna Leigh: She is 17 and makes $1,40,000/ year.
  
• JW Johnson: He is 21 years old and makes $20,00,000/ year.
  
• Collin Johns: He is 31 and makes $18,00,000/ yearKindly check the following video to learn more about top picklers who earn well:

   

What is the future of professional players?

This game is said to be the USA’s most popular and trending sport in history. It has a bright future with magnificent growth in rewards, memberships, officiating, sponsorship partners, and overall press media.
Playing such a marvelous game at the national, rural, and college levels creates earning opportunities for emerging players who actually have the potential to grow! And, plus point is you can balance your work and academics with this game too in the initial phase. It may not be possible for other famous games like tennis, football, etc., where players start to practice for 7-8 hrs in their early years.

1. The USA Pickleball 2023 Annual Growth Report states that there were:A total of 78,766 memberships happened which was 15 percent more over 2023.
2. For the first time, the National Pickleball League was the first ever to be sanctioned by USA Pickleball with six events at Chicken N Pickle locations.
3. USAPA awarded total of $43,500 divided in as below:
   92 Youth Grants,
   4 Collegiate Grants,
   69 Community Grants.
4. At the end of 2023, 18 referees retired but new 227 Certified Referees registered!
5. Professional Pickleball Registry had 7,252 new PPR members.

If we study the latest PPA rankings, it is seen that the top picklers are young (below 25 years of age) and have rankings above 14000.

image data source : Zip recruiter

Average salaries for pro players for other popular games. 

If we compare the average income or salaries of pro picklers with other games, you can see a difference. But.it also important to note that this game has gained growth and popularity in much less time than other sports like Tenis, Curling, Darts, Bowling, Tennis, Golf and Table Tennis.

Conclusion:

Becoming a professional pickleball player is easy. You must have dedication, determination, consistent practice, and patience to reach those 7-figure incomes. If all of your cards fall in the right places, you can easily reach 100,000 to 120,000 USD in upcoming years (on average). Of course, the earning fluctuates with the competition level, your passion and willingness, type of event, and difficulty level. 

I hope this article has given you potential insights to earn money via pickleball. If you are a pro-pickler, don’t forget to try for the above-mentioned income sources like YouTube, coaching, influencer marketing, etc. 

 Keep practicing and make your dreams of becoming a pro-pickler come true!