Is Foam the Future of Pickleball?

‍By Justin Barton & Jon Park

There’s been a lot of buzz lately about foam-core paddles—some say they’ll revolutionize the sport, others call them a passing fad. After a year of advising brands, dissecting construction methods, and testing foam across all levels of play, I can tell you it’s more nuanced than the hype.

Why Foam? Why Now?

At this point, pickleball technology is still immature. Paddle construction has just been borrowing materials from other industries—honeycomb panels from RVs, boats, and aerospace and edge banding from commercial applications. They work, but few were designed specifically for pickleball. Foam cores can change that. It gives brands flexibility to shape the feel, response, and sound of the paddle in ways honeycomb cores just can’t.

Every brand’s chasing full-foam, but CRBN got there first. TruFoam took 18 months of R&D, and now the rest of the industry is playing catch-up.

When Jon asked CRBN founder Kyle Goguen, he said: “We’re seeing a wave of brands racing to copy or create their own version. Others will catch up eventually, but so far, nothing has matched our standards for performance or durability.”

Jon even asked about Enhance Pickleball’s all-foam paddle, which appears to take cues from CRBN’s core design.

“We can’t speak to specific brands or products,” Kyle said. “What we can say is we’ve poured serious time, money, and resources into developing TruFoam—from materials and construction to player testing and IP protection. That level of investment only makes sense if we’re just as serious about defending it.”

By year’s end, expect the market to be flooded with full-foam paddles. Diadem, for one, is going all-in with BluCore—launching nine paddles next month. When Jon asked Michael Manglardi, Co-Founder of Diadem Sports, whether launching so many at once could create confusion or cannibalize their own lineup, he didn’t hesitate:

“Not at all. We were deliberate from day one. Our goal was simple—to make a paddle for every type of player. With three shapes and three thicknesses, we’re confident there’s something for everyone.”

What is Foam?

Think of foam like you would metals—aluminum, steel, iron, gold. They all fall under the same category, but each has very different properties and uses. Foam is no different. It’s a broad material category with countless formulations, each offering unique characteristics.

Some foams have higher energy return, others offer more compressive or shear strength. Some are rigid and strong; others feel soft and rubbery. These differences affect not only how a paddle plays but also how easily it can be manufactured.

The challenge is finding a foam that strikes the right balance; easy enough to produce reliably, while still delivering great performance on the court.

The Challenges of Manufacturing Foam

Right now, many foam paddles never make it beyond the prototyping stage.

Some develop face divots because the foam’s compressive strength isn’t high enough to maintain shape under pressure. Others experience delamination or disbonding—where the facing layers separate from the core or from each other due to poor adhesion or excessive movement.

There are multiple reasons these failures happen, but the most critical factor—regardless of foam type—is density. Foam density directly affects both weight and compressive strength. Most paddle foams fall in the range of 80 to 120 kg/m³, with very little room to go higher while staying within acceptable paddle weight limits.

Pickleball paddles have very specific limitations

Players like their paddles in a tight weight range. The tolerance window for an acceptable production paddle is only about 20 grams. That leaves manufacturers very little room to work with, especially when experimenting with new materials like foam.

On the plus side, if a foam paddle gets squished half a millimeter too much—so what? It doesn’t core crush like honeycomb cores. You’d have to over-compress it significantly before the foam starts shearing apart. But go the other direction and don’t compress enough? Now you’ve got bonding issues from poor adhesion.

Even with high-quality foam, there’s a major caveat: thermal sensitivity. Foam reacts more to heat and cold than honeycomb. At 100°F, it can soften and play differently than it does at 50°F. That heat-induced flexibility increases internal movement, which puts more stress on adhesives and can lead to disbonding.

And that’s one of the toughest challenges in R&D. Some of the best foams for performance are the worst when it comes to bonding. Sometimes they just don’t glue well.

What are the different types of foam?

The first method is blown foam. Chemically blown foam uses a chemical foaming agent to generate gas within a polymer. The result is extruded into sheets or blocks, then cut to size.

The second method is beaded foam, which is what we see in things like Diadem’s BluCore or CRBN’s TruFoam. Tiny pre-foamed beads—like bean bag filler—are packed into a mold, pressurized, and heated. They expand and fuse into a solid structure. This method allows for custom shapes and strong bonds, making it great for durability and strength.

There’s also supercritical foam, a cleaner, high-tech version of blown foam using nitrogen. It’s not in pickleball yet, but maybe one day. Supercritical uses a supercritical fluid to expand a polymer, resulting in a highly uniform and lightweight foam with small, closed cells.

Now, onto types of foam we see in paddles:

EPP (Expanded Polypropylene): Beaded foam. Same base material as polypropylene honeycomb cores, but in a different form. Diadem’s BluCore uses this.
PMI Foam: Seen in Adidas Metalbone. Blown foam, not beaded. Very dense, very stiff. Feels tinny and doesn’t dampen vibration well.
EVA Foam: Super soft and flexible. You might recognize this from the Ripple—though it’s not 100% foam; it needs carbon inserts just to maintain structure.

The durability myth

One of the big selling points you hear about foam paddles is that they’re “more durable” than honeycomb paddles. That’s true in some cases, but not universally. Foam doesn’t crush the same way polypropylene does under pressure. But it can separate from the face if the adhesive is weak or uneven.

Foam is also susceptible to compression fatigue. Like running shoes that flatten over time, foam can slowly lose bounce in high-impact areas. Good foams minimize it, but it’s still possible over months of play.

Players are rough on paddles. We’re smashing hard plastic balls, outdoors, hundreds of times a session. Expecting any material to stay perfect for years is a big ask.

So yes, foam has durability potential. But it’s not a miracle cure. You still have to build it right.

The future is exciting

Foam isn’t going to kill plastic honeycomb paddles anytime soon. And even years down the line, polypropylene cores could still likely play a role in a brand’s lineup of paddle offerings.

But foam is pushing the envelope. It’s opening new lanes for paddle design, helping engineers think beyond the plastic cores we’ve been so accustomed to.

In my opinion, I see composite lattice cores as the next manufacturing direction. But first, we need to master foam.

So yes, foam paddles are intriguing—and sometimes overhyped. The real magic happens when brands solve the manufacturing puzzle and leverage foam’s unique properties. Until then, it remains one of the most promising innovations in pickleball equipment.

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