Pickleball Outfits for Women (What People Actually Wear to Open Play)

Search for what to wear and you get a hundred pages of skort photography, all of it published by companies that sell skorts. The clothes are fine. The problem is that none of those pages tell you what the court is actually like, which is the part you want to know before you walk onto one for the first time.

So this is the version from the court instead of the catalog.

What do women actually wear to play pickleball?

At a public court on a weekday morning, the honest answer is: a mix. You will see skorts, you will see running shorts from 2014, you will see leggings, and you will see one woman in full matching kit who is either very serious or very new. All of them are playing the same game.

The most common setup is a skort, a breathable shirt, and court shoes. A skort is popular for a practical reason and not a fashion one: it has real shorts built in underneath, so you can lunge for a ball at the net without thinking about it, and most of them have a pocket.

That pocket matters more than the rest of the outfit. Which brings us to the thing nobody warns you about.

Where do you put the extra ball?

In doubles, the server usually holds a second ball so play does not stop every time one rolls away. If your bottoms have no pockets, you are holding it in your non-paddle hand for the entire point, or you are setting it down and walking back for it, or you are tucking it into your waistband and hoping.

This is the single most useful thing to check before you buy anything: does it have a pocket that closes. A lot of women's athletic wear does not, and a lot of the pockets that exist are too shallow to hold a ball through a lunge. Men's shorts almost always have them, which is why nobody writes about this.

If you love a skort that has no pocket, the fix is a wristband with a small pocket, or just accepting that you will be the person who plays with a ball in her hand.

Skort, shorts, or leggings?

All three are normal. The choice is about temperature and what you want to think about while playing.

A skort is the default for a reason. Built-in shorts, usually a pocket, and enough coverage that you are not adjusting anything when you reach low. If you are buying one thing, buy this.

Athletic shorts work exactly as well and cost less if you already own them. Look for a five to seven inch inseam. Very short running shorts ride up during lateral movement, which pickleball has a lot of.

Leggings are the standard indoors and in cold weather. In August heat they hold warmth against your legs and most players switch. Below sixty degrees they are better than anything else.

There is no version of this where the wrong choice costs you a point. Pick by comfort and move on. If you are still deciding what else you need, the full rundown of what to wear covers the pieces that apply to everybody.

What kind of shirt should you wear?

A breathable shirt with sleeves you can move in. That is the whole requirement.

The real decision is fabric, and it depends entirely on how hard you are playing. Synthetic performance fabric moves sweat off your skin, which is what you want for three competitive games in real heat. Cotton does not, and in August it will hold everything you sweat into it.

For everything else, and everything else is most of the hours anybody spends around this sport, cotton is more comfortable and looks like normal clothing. Warming up, a casual round of open play, driving over, standing around afterwards. That is where a cotton shirt belongs, and pretending otherwise is how you end up with a drawer of performance apparel you only wear to the gym.

One rule that is not about comfort: do not wear yellow or yellow-green on an outdoor court. Outdoor pickleballs are optic yellow, and a top in that shade makes the ball hard for the other team to pick up against your body. It is the only clothing choice in this sport that genuinely affects play, and it is why nothing in our collection is yellow.