Pickleball once barely registered outside a handful of retirement communities. Now it’s one of the fastest-growing sports on the continent, and the obsession doesn’t stop at the US border. From Hawaii to Prince Edward Island, courts are filling up and searches are spiking across all of North America.
CanadaSportsBetting.ca ranked all 64 US states and Canadian provinces and territories on a Pickleball Obsession Index (0-10). The score combines the number of pickleball venues per capita, Google search volume for pickleball-related terms, and Google Trends interest data for the sport.
North America’s Top 10 Most Obsessed Regions
1. Hawaii
Hawaii tops the entire continent with an index score of 8.35. It has 522 pickleball courts, working out to 11.2 venues per 100k residents, and a perfect Google Trends score of 100/100. Add 18,400 annual pickleball searches, or 1,284 per 100k people, and no state or province comes close.
2. Prince Edward Island
Canada’s first appearance on the list comes early. PEI scores 7.80, just 0.55 points behind Hawaii, and posts the second-highest venue rate in the entire dataset at 13.7 courts per 100k residents, trailing only Vermont. Its Google Trends score of 92 and 750 searches per 100k people round out a genuinely elite showing for a province of under 200,000 people.
3. Utah
Utah is the top-ranked US state outside Hawaii, with an index score of 7.73. It posts 1,378 annual searches per 100k residents, among the highest search intensity anywhere, and backs it up with 1,694 courts across the state.
4. Vermont
Vermont scores 7.42, driven almost entirely by infrastructure: its 15.8 venues per 100k residents is the highest venue rate of any state or province in the entire dataset. Its search volume, 586 per 100k people, is comparatively modest for a top-four finisher.
5. British Columbia
BC is Canada’s second entry in the top 10, scoring 6.70. It has the highest Google Trends score in Canada at 94/100 and the most pickleball courts of any Canadian province, 1,544 in total.
6. Colorado
Colorado rounds out the mid-pack with a score of 6.45, built on 1,968 courts and 1,264 searches per 100k residents, though its Google Trends score of 76 trails the leaders.
7. Ontario
Canada’s most populous province is the country’s third top-10 entry, scoring 6.37. Its per-capita venue rate of 6.0 per 100k residents is modest for a top-10 finisher, but its total search volume, 218,500 annual searches, is the highest of any Canadian province and fourth-highest of all 64 regions, behind only California, Texas and Florida.
8. Florida
Florida scores 6.30, powered by sheer scale: 7,674 pickleball courts and 280,500 annual searches, the third-highest total search volume in North America behind only California and Texas.
9. Minnesota
Minnesota comes in at 6.26, with 2,057 courts and a Google Trends score of 78, one of the stronger cultural interest numbers among the US states in the top 10.
10. Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia closes out the top 10, and gives Canada four regions in the continental top 10. Its score of 6.23 is driven by 10.9 venues per 100k residents, the second-highest infrastructure rate in Canada behind only PEI.
Canada’s Provinces and Territories: The Full Picture
While four Canadian regions crack the continental top 10, the picture shifts sharply once you look at all 13 provinces and territories on their own terms.
PEI leads the country by a wide margin, its score of 7.80 sitting 1.10 points clear of second-placed BC. Ontario (6.37), Nova Scotia (6.23) and New Brunswick (5.93) fill out a strong top five, with the Maritimes punching well above their population weight on venue access alone: Nova Scotia’s 10.9 courts per 100k residents and New Brunswick’s 10.1 both rank inside the top six of all 64 regions, behind only Vermont, PEI and Maine.
Further down, Yukon (5.18) and Alberta (5.16) sit mid-table, while Quebec is the country’s biggest outlier. Despite the second-highest total search volume of any Canadian province (109,450 annual searches), Quebec’s low venue rate, just 2.0 courts per 100k residents, drags its overall score down to 4.99, good for eighth nationally.
The bottom of the Canadian table is dominated by the territories. Manitoba (3.97) and Saskatchewan (3.60) trail the provinces, but Newfoundland and Labrador (3.08), Northwest Territories (2.03) and Nunavut (1.28) occupy the last three spots in the country, and three of the last four in all of North America. Nunavut has no recorded pickleball venues at all, while the Northwest Territories has just one.
Conclusion
Pickleball’s growth isn’t stopping at any border. Hawaii and the Mountain West lead the way in the US, but PEI, BC, Ontario and Nova Scotia prove Canada is keeping pace at the top of the table, even as the country’s north has yet to pick up a paddle. With courts still being built out across the continent, expect plenty of movement in next year’s rankings.
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Methodology
To find out which states, provinces and territories are the most obsessed with pickleball, we created a Pickleball Obsession Index covering all 50 US states and 13 Canadian provinces and territories, based on three factors that reflect both the accessibility of the sport and the level of public interest. Each metric was assigned a weight to indicate its significance in measuring pickleball enthusiasm.
Metrics & Weighting
- Places to Play Pickleball (Per 100k People) — 5/10: Accessibility is key to participation. The more courts and venues available, the easier it is for people to get involved, indicating strong infrastructure for the sport. Data sourced from Pickleheads (US) and the Pickleball Canada Directory (Canada).
- Pickleball Yearly Search Volume (Per 100k People) — 3/10: The volume of Google searches for pickleball-related terms provides insight into public interest and curiosity. Data sourced from Google Keyword Planner across 10 core keywords (pickleball, pickleball ball, pickleball paddles, pickleball court, pickleball courts near me, court pickleball, pickleball near me, pickleball equipment, pickleball rules, how to play pickleball).
- Pickleball Interest by Region — 2/10: Google Trends data illustrates how popular pickleball is in each state, province or territory, helping capture cultural interest beyond courts and search volume alone.
Scoring & Ranking
Each region was scored out of 10 for each metric, benchmarked against the highest-performing region across all of North America, then combined using the weights above to produce a final Obsession Score. All 64 regions are ranked together from 1 (most obsessed) to 64 (least obsessed); Canadian provinces and territories are additionally ranked 1 to 13 against each other. Population baseline: 2025 estimates from the US Census Bureau and Statistics Canada.
