We’ve been asked if padel is good exercise for losing weight. Because you have a high average heart rate throughout the padel match, you burn a lot of fat.
I’ve played many matches myself with my Apple Watch, measuring metrics such as heart rate, burn rate and number of steps. Now the Apple Watch is not a source of facts, but it does give an indication of what range we are at.
In the article, I go through the following:
- Is padel good exercise?
- How many calories do you burn playing padel?
- How many steps you take in an hour of padel
- How much weight you can lose from padel
Here we go – let’s start with the conditions below…
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My conditions
It is very important to point out that we all have different conditions that play a role in how your burn looks both on and off the padel court. In order to give a concrete example of how much I burn when I play padel, here are my conditions:
- Male, 30 years old
- In relatively good shape
- 30 years old, 180 cm tall and weigh 85 kg.
- Player level 7 according to our table of padel levels
- Measures heart rate and burn with an Apple Watch set to Squash (padel not available)
My total fat & calories I burn during a padel match
Below is a printscreen from my phone that tells you what my workout looked like. So I burned 1247 calories in 1 hour and 41 minutes of playing padel. Now please note that the app is set to squash and that an Apple Watch is not always the best tool for measuring heart rate, burn, etc.
In the next picture below you can see me playing a match as a forehand player. This means that I played with the racket facing outwards on the court. Generally speaking, you handle fewer overhand strokes and this can also contribute to you not being quite as involved in the game. But again, it can vary from match to match.
Here you can see that the average heart rate is lower, 138 instead of 150, and that the total active calories burned are about 20% lower compared to the previous match when I played as a backhand player. Now there is a difference of a few minutes in how long the matches were as well.
Lose weight playing padel
You can lose weight with padel. It takes a deficit of 7000 calories to lose 1 kg of fat in a week. When you play padel, you burn about 600-1200 calories in a 90-minute match. This means that you can lose an estimated 0.2-0.5kg per week by playing padel three times a week.
There are many factors involved and it is therefore difficult to say exactly how much weight you can lose by playing padel.
How many steps is an hour of padel?
When you play padel, you take about 2500-4000 steps per hour. This can be more or less depending on your level and style of play.
According to my Apple Watch, I take about 5,000 steps in a 90-minute match.
How many calories do you burn in padel?
You burn about 500-1000 calories per match (90 minutes). The range depends on your style of play, your level and your personal physique.
According to my Apple Watch, I burn about 1000-1200 calories per padel match. I think that’s what’s known as a joy number. Probably it’s slightly lower as an an actual figure. Below, the first table shows the calorie consumption when I play padel.
| Estimated burning of calories padel (energy) | For an 85 kg person |
| 5 minutes | 61 calories |
| 10 minutes | 122 calories |
| 15 minutes | 183 calories |
| 30 minutes | 366 calories |
| 1 hours | 733 calories |
| 2 hours | 1466 calories |
| 3 hours | 2200 calories |
| 4 hours | 2932 calories |
If we look at the estimated calorie burn of a person who weighs about 15 kg less than me, it differs quite a lot in percentage terms. Below you can see the calorie burn in padel for a person weighing 70kg.
| Estimated burning of calories padel (energy) | For an 85 kg person |
| 5 minutes | 49 Calories |
| 10 minutes | 98 Calories |
| 15 minutes | 147 Calories |
| 30 minutes | 294 Calories |
| 1 minutes | 588 Calories |
| 2 minutes | 1176 Calories |
| 3 minutes | 1764 Calories |
| 4 minutes | 2352 Calories |
Source: Fatsecret.se
