With so many games now becoming part of major world competitions, any pickleball player may wonder: will pickleball become an Olympic Sport?

With similar sports like tennis already part of the Olympics, pickleball being added to the roster would be no surprise. But will it get there?

To be recognized as an Olympic sport, the International Olympic Committee would have to recognize it as a sport. Olympic sports need to be played in 40-75 countries across 4 continents, depending on whether it is a male or female sport. Pickleball does not meet that criterion, but it may in the future.

It’s not quite there yet, but it may be pretty soon! As the fastest growing sport, it’ll be no time before you’d hear about Olympic pickleball.

We dug into a number of things, from the game itself to the Olympic standards for sports to come to a conclusion on this topic.

Can Pickleball Make It To The Olympics?

Before you ask if it’ll become part of the Olympics, a better question to ask would be can it be part of the Olympics?

When you think of the Olympics, you probably think of a few more common sports, like swimming or running, or sledding for the winters. In reality, official Olympic sports include a much larger variety of games and sports.

So, at first glance, it may seem silly to think that pickleball could be played during the Olympics, but in reality, it wouldn’t be too out of place at all! In fact, similar games like tennis, badminton and ping pong are already on the Olympic roster, and pickleball could fit in very easily.

Net sports are already popular, and since pickleball is fast, suspenseful and easy to understand, people are sure to enjoy watching it.

When Do New Sports Get Added?

Sports that have been part of the Olympics for a while will naturally get more attention – they air during the prime TV hours, after all, and are talked about more often. This means that when new sports get added, they may not get much attention – if any at all.

In fact, in the 2016 Olympics, rugby and golf were readded to the games, despite having been eliminated earlier. Since neither of these falls under ‘mainstream’ sports, it’s likely that most people wouldn’t even have realized it.

On the other hand, the 2020 Olympics introduced five new sports! Clearly, when new sports get added to the games isn’t much of an issue.

How Does the Committee Decide What Sports Are Included?

There is a way larger number of sports in the world than we think they are. New games are being created by bored people every day. Consider pickleball itself: created as a replacement for badminton because of a missing shuttlecock, it is now widely played across North America.

You may invent the most exciting sport ever, but whether or not it gets added to the Olympic games does not depend on how good it is as a game.

For one thing, the sport in question should have official, international regulation. That is, the rules of the game are clearly decided and announced by a non-governmental entity so that there are no differences in the way people in different countries play it.

That means that your backyard sport invention with the rules written on a scrap of paper won’t cut it, but maybe a few decades down the line, you could try it out again.

If the IOC thinks that the sport in question meets that standard, it moves on to the drug tests. Any major players of the game would have to be tested to make sure that they do not use performance-enhancing drugs.

The next step is to check the international popularity threshold. Since the Olympics are an international sport, you can’t just add sports that are played only in North America because that wouldn’t be fair for the rest of the world. Out of approximately 200 countries in the world, any Olympic sport needs to meet a minimum requirement. For male athletes, a minimum of 75 countries over four continents should play the game, while for female athletes, 40 countries over three continents.

And even if it meets all of these standards, your sport is still not necessarily added to the Olympics roster, but your chances are much higher!

At the end of the day, it is worth remembering that the Olympics is a business, more so than a sports event. The ultimate goal is to make a profit, and that means that if a sport doesn’t manage to spark interest in the viewers, then there is a high chance it won’t be added.

On top of that, there are also some practical concerns around the topic. How do you decide when to add a specific game, if at all? Suppose the IOC considers adding pickleball to the Olympics, but the host country does not have the facilities needed for the sport. It can’t be added! Such things are also a concern when it comes to whether or not a sport can be included.

What About Pickleball?

Clearly, it’s not all that easy to get added to the Olympic sports invitation list, and truthfully, Pickleball doesn’t actually meet the standards.

While it does have an official regulatory body – the International Federation of Pickleball – which helps spread it around the world, the game itself is largely US-centric, and played almost entirely in North America. This falls short of the 75 country requirement for an Olympic sport by a large degree. On that front, there isn’t much anyone can do, besides try to spread the game’s popularity.

On the plus side, Pickleball is growing very fast! Though it’s not quite there yet – far from it, in fact – the growing popularity suggests that there is no reason you wouldn’t find it played all over the world a few years from now. Currently, it is still largely centered in the US, but with some luck, we may find it played in the Olympics some day.

Though it’s still too soon to make any real claims, some pickleball experts say they’re keeping their hopes up for the 2028 Olympics. Others are less optimistic, but who knows?