Pinpointing who is the best pickleball player in the world requires separating casual backyard lore from the physical realities of professional tour play. The sport has expanded far beyond country club recreation into a grueling, high-speed professional circuit characterized by six-figure prize purses, television broadcast contracts, and fierce roster competition across the Carvana PPA Tour and Major League Pickleball (MLP).
Every week on municipal hardcourts and community forums, casual fans debate who’s the best pickleball player in the world, while diehard players analyze shift dynamics across singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles, and mixed brackets. Answering who is the best pickleball player is no longer a simple one-name answer. Today, it demands an analysis of statistical dominance, tournament win streaks, and tactical shotmaking across separate competitive divisions.
Who Is the Best Pickleball Player in the World?
- The Definitive Verdict: The best pickleball player in the world is Ben Johns in the men’s division and Anna Leigh Waters in the women’s division.
- Pound-for-Pound Dominance: Anna Leigh Waters is universally recognized as the single most dominant player in the sport. Waters holds the World No. 1 ranking simultaneously across Women’s Singles, Women’s Doubles, and Mixed Doubles, with over 202 career PPA Tour gold medals and 45 Triple Crowns.
- The Historic Standard: Ben Johns stands as the men’s World No. 1 and the historic Greatest of All Time (GOAT), holding over 185 PPA titles and 21 Triple Crowns.
- The Disciplinary Nuance: In men’s singles, Federico Staksrud and Chris Haworth challenge for top tournament honors, but Johns retains the overall throne through masterclass doubles play.
1. Quick Guide: Master World Leaderboard at a Glance
To understand how the elite professional tier stacks up across competitive disciplines, the matrix below benchmarks the reigning champions, career medal hauls, paddle equipment, and defining physical attributes:
2. The Undisputed GOAT: Who Is the Best Pickleball Player of All Time?
Whenever sports enthusiasts gather to debate who is the best pickleball player of all time, the conversation invariably begins and ends with Ben Johns. Hailing from Laytonsville, Maryland, Johns transitioned from competitive table tennis and tennis into pickleball in 2016. Within three years, he established a stranglehold over professional pickleball that reshaped the tactical foundation of the entire sport.
Between 2019 and 2023, Johns constructed a statistical resume that remains unmatched in professional racquet sports history. He accumulated a historic 108-match winning streak in men’s singles—a feat that saw him go over a year without dropping a single competitive match. Across his illustrious career, he has amassed more than 185 PPA Tour gold medals and 21 Triple Crowns (sweeping singles, doubles, and mixed doubles at the exact same tournament). For context, no other male player in the history of the sport has achieved more than four Triple Crowns.
Ben Johns (USA)
What Makes Ben Johns the Best Pickleball Player? The Anatomy of Mastery
Casual observers watching television broadcasts often ask what makes ben johns the best pickleball player when his game appears deceptively effortless. While younger players run faster and swing harder, Johns dominates through court geometry, anticipation, and proprietary mechanical technique.
Career Benchmark: 185+ PPA Gold Medals | 21 Triple Crowns | 108 Consecutive Singles Wins | Reigning Men’s World No. 1
The Four Pillars of Ben Johns’ Tactical Supremacy
- 1. The Pioneering Backhand Roll: Prior to Johns, kitchen dinking was primarily a defensive pushing exercise. Johns invented the modern two-handed and one-handed dipping topspin backhand roll. By brushing up the back of a ball falling below the net cord, he generates heavy topspin that dips viciously at his opponent’s feet, forcing upward pop-ups.
- 2. Soft Reset Mastery & Absorption: When opponents unleash 55 mph baseline drives or ferocious kitchen speed-ups, Johns does not panic. He loosens his grip pressure (holding his 16mm Joola paddle at a 3 out of 10 tension level) and absorbs incoming kinetic energy, dropping the ball dead inside the kitchen boundary.
- 3. Deceleration & Court Geometry: While opponents scramble frantically, Johns moves in measured, balanced strides. He plays pickleball like a grandmaster playing speed chess, systematically depriving opponents of offensive angles until they make an impatient error.
- 4. The Right-Side Synergy Framework: Alongside his brother Collin Johns, Ben perfected the ‘stacking’ strategy in men’s doubles. Collin anchors the right half of the court with robotic dinking consistency, creating the exact defensive stability Ben needs to slide across the center line and poach put-aways.
3. The Queen of the Court: Who Is the Best Female Pickleball Player?
If Ben Johns is the sport’s Michael Jordan, Anna Leigh Waters is its Serena Williams. When fans ask who is the best female pickleball player or search who is the best female pickleball player?, there is zero debate among tournament directors, touring pros, or broadcast analysts. Waters is not merely the premier woman in the sport; she is the most dominant athlete in professional sports today.
Turning professional at the astonishing age of 12 alongside her mother Leigh Waters, Anna Leigh revolutionized women’s pickleball by introducing blistering baseline power, hyper-aggressive transition drives, and cat-like reflexes at the Non-Volley Zone (kitchen). By late 2026, Waters officially crossed the historic milestone of 202 career PPA Tour gold medals and 45 Triple Crowns—all before turning 20 years old.
Anna Leigh Waters (USA)
Pound-for-Pound Dominance: Why Waters Transcends the Tour
The statistical gap between Waters and the rest of the women’s professional bracket is substantially wider than any margin seen in the men’s game. In women’s doubles (partnering with Canadian Olympian Catherine Parenteau) and mixed doubles (partnering with Ben Johns), Waters has authored consecutive match-winning streaks stretching past 70 tournament rounds.
Unlike traditional baseline retrievers, Waters attacks relentlessly. Her two-handed backhand drive carries heavy topspin and pace, allowing her to speed up balls from deep in the transition zone that traditional coaches label ‘unattackable.’ At the kitchen line, her hand speed is so electrifying that even elite male pros in mixed doubles actively avoid hitting to her side of the court.
Catherine Parenteau
World #2 Doubles | Selkirk Pro
Metronomic crosscourt consistency and 54+ PPA Tour gold medals.
Anna Bright
World #3 Doubles | Paddletek Pro
High-energy verbal intensity and explosive forehand speed-up attacks.
4. Who Is the Best Male Pickleball Player? Top 5 Global Contenders
While Ben Johns remains the anchor of the men’s game, the era of him effortlessly sweeping every gold medal weekend is officially over. A new generation of hungry, ex-collegiate tennis players possessing raw athletic firepower and specialized two-handed backhands has closed the skill gap. Today, evaluating who is the best male pickleball player requires examining the top five contenders actively challenging the throne:
1. Ben Johns (USA)
World #1 Overall / GOAT
The undisputed king of doubles strategy. While Johns has scaled back his singles tournament commitments to preserve joint longevity, his mixed doubles dominance with Anna Leigh Waters and his men’s doubles partnership with Gabe Tardio keep him locked atop the global rankings.
2. Gabriel ‘Gabe’ Tardio (Bolivia / USA)
World #2 Doubles
At just 20 years old, Tardio has established himself as the most exciting young talent in the game. Playing the right-side position, Tardio utilizes lightning-fast wrists to disguise forehand flicks and roll volleys from ankle height. His partnership with Ben Johns has ushered in a new era of ultra-aggressive men’s doubles play.
3. Federico Staksrud (Argentina)
World #3 Overall / #1 Singles
A former collegiate tennis star from the University of San Diego, Staksrud dethroned Ben Johns as the World No. 1 Men’s Singles player during a historic 2024–2025 campaign. Known as the ‘Iron Man’ of the PPA Tour, Staksrud’s physical endurance, court coverage, and pinpoint passing shots make him virtually unbeatable in extended three-game singles grinds.
4. JW Johnson (USA)
World #4 All-Court
Known across the tour for his robotic, ice-cold demeanor, JW possesses arguably the quickest hands in professional pickleball. He rarely shows emotion, yet his ability to redirect 60 mph firefights into unreturnable angles has earned him gold medals across singles, men’s doubles, and mixed doubles.
5. Christian Alshon & Hayden Patriquin (USA)
World #5 / Athletic Vanguard
Alshon (a former NCAA National Champion at the University of Virginia) brings electrifying athleticism, diving catches, and thunderous power to every match. Alongside teenage phenom Hayden Patriquin (known as ‘Big H’), these young stars represent the fearless future of the sport.
5. How Professional Pickleball Rankings Work: The 2026 Unified WPR System
A common source of confusion among searchers investigating who is the world’s best pickleball player stems from conflicting tour leaderboards. Historically, the PPA Tour, the Association of Pickleball Players (APP), and Major League Pickleball (MLP) operated separate ranking spreadsheets. In 2026, the sport unified under the official World Pickleball Ranking (WPR) system.
The unified WPR formula does not simply tally raw gold medals. Instead, it calculates an overall composite rating based on weighted mathematical performance across the three core disciplines:
The Official 2026 WPR Weighted Formula Breakdown
- 1. Gender Doubles (50% Overall Weight): Men’s and Women’s Doubles represents the flagship commercial and spectator discipline of the sport. Wins at PPA Grand Slams and Masters events earn maximum points.
- 2. Mixed Doubles (35% Overall Weight): High-stakes mixed competition tests communication, gender-balanced court positioning, and aggressive poaching ability.
- 3. Singles (15% Overall Weight): While physically grueling, singles carries a 15% weight in overall player standings, reflecting lower tournament participation among veteran doubles stars.
- Why the Formula Matters: This weighted structure explains why Federico Staksrud can dominate the singles tour yet sit behind Ben Johns in overall global standings. Johns’ massive point hauls in doubles (50%) and mixed (35%) give him an insurmountable overall lead.
6. The Community Debate: Is Ben Johns Still the Best in the World?
On community forums like Reddit r/Pickleball and player podcasts, an intense debate rages: who is considered the best pickleball player today, and is Ben Johns truly still the best player in pickleball?
The consensus among knowledgeable players reveals a nuanced reality. In singles, the community agrees that the field has caught up to and surpassed Johns. Younger players with elite collegiate tennis backgrounds generate more topspin, cover the baseline with greater speed, and exploit Johns’ preference for controlled kitchen play. Johns frequently loses early-round singles matches or opts out of the draw entirely.
However, when the debate shifts to doubles—which represents 95% of recreational and professional play—Johns remains the benchmark. His ability to diagnose an opponent’s weakness within three rallies, his partnership with Anna Leigh Waters, and his calm execution on championship match points ensure that whenever a major tournament reaches Sunday, Johns is standing on the center court podium.
7. What Gear Do the World’s Best Pickleball Players Use?
Elite players do not use off-the-shelf recreational gear. Their equipment is custom-tuned with lead tape, specialized overgrips, and advanced composite materials to maximize spin RPM and sweet spot stability:
8. Frequently Asked Questions: Best Pickleball Players Decoded
Who is the best pickleball player in the world right now?
Who is the best female pickleball player?
Who is the best pickleball player of all time?
How much money do top pickleball players make?
What paddle does Ben Johns use?
Has anyone beaten Anna Leigh Waters in singles?
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