Pickleball injury statistics,
from the actual studies.

The participation boom behind the injury numbers

Injury counts only make sense against the size of the sport. Per the Sports & Fitness Industry Association, 24.3 million Americans played pickleball in 2025, up roughly 171.8% in three years, making it the fastest-growing sport in the country for several years running. More players means more total injuries, even if the sport itself has not become more dangerous per hour played.

Emergency department injuries are climbing fast

A 10-year analysis of the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS) estimated 66,350 pickleball injuries treated in US emergency departments between 2013 and 2022, weighted from 1,110 recorded cases. The curve is steep at the end: estimated annual ED injuries rose 91% from 2020 to 2022 (roughly 8,900 to 17,000 per year), and pickleball-related hospital admissions rose 257% over the same two years.

Falls are the dominant mechanism, accounting for about 65.5% of ED-treated injuries.

Who gets hurt

• Ages 65 to 80 account for about 61% of ED-treated injuries; ages 35 to 64 account for roughly another 31%.
• In the fracture data, about 69% of pickleball fractures occur in women, most often upper-extremity fractures after a fall in women over 60.
• In the 10-year ED data, men sustained most of the lower-leg injuries (17.5% of male injuries involved the lower leg), and calf injuries in particular occur more often in men.

What kinds of injuries

In the 10-year NEISS analysis, fractures account for 32.7% of ED-treated pickleball injuries, with strains and sprains close behind at 30.8%. Among fractures, the wrist is the most common site (29.2% of fractures), consistent with the fall-onto-outstretched-hand mechanism. A separate NEISS study focused on fractures found a 90-fold increase in pickleball-related fractures between 2002 and 2022.

The foot and ankle picture

This is the part of the data podiatrists watch. Across the injury literature:

• In the 10-year ED data, the ankle, knee, and lower leg together account for roughly a quarter of all pickleball injuries (ankle 6.1%, knee 7.0%, lower leg 11.7%).
• In a clinical review of 166 lower-extremity pickleball and paddle-sport injuries, the single most common injury was the ankle sprain (21.7%), followed by Achilles tendon rupture (12.1%).
• A sudden change of direction is the mechanism in 54.2% of those lower-extremity injuries, which matches how the sport is played: short bursts, hard stops, and lateral lunges on a small court.

The clinical pattern behind those numbers is familiar from the exam room: ankle sprains from lateral cuts, Achilles ruptures and calf tears during sudden push-offs (especially in men over 40), Achilles tendinitis and plantar fasciitis from rapid increases in playing volume, and forefoot overload from all the time spent on the ball of the foot at the kitchen line. Our full pickleball foot-health guide covers each of these, and our shoe reviews cover the court-shoe side, because a surprising share of these injuries start with players wearing running shoes on a court.

A podiatrist's read on the data

Three patterns stand out. First, this is largely a falls story in older adults: the age curve and the wrist-fracture pattern travel together. Second, the lower-extremity data is a deceleration story: ankles and Achilles tendons fail during sudden stops and direction changes, not during steady play. Third, none of this makes pickleball dangerous relative to its enormous health benefits for the population playing it; it makes preparation worth taking seriously: court shoes rather than running shoes, gradual volume increases for new players, and calf and balance conditioning for players over 50. General education, not individual medical advice; a clinician who has examined you beats any statistics page.

How to cite this page

Everything here is free to reference. Suggested citation: "Pickleball Injury Statistics, MyHealthyFeet.org (2026), compiled from NEISS analyses and peer-reviewed literature", with a link to this page. For the underlying figures, please also cite the original studies below.