JOOLA pickleball paddle grip: 5.71 in belongs on the RFQ

Near the bottom of a JOOLA paddle listing there is a spec block. One line in it reads Grip Length: 5.5in, between the grip type and the grip circumference. It is easy to skim past on the way down to the weight. For a brand placing an order, that line decides how much face the paddle has. It is also one of the few numbers a factory cannot move without a tooling decision.

I opened 22 JOOLA product pages on 24 October 2026 and read the spec block on each. Nineteen of them publish a grip length, and fifteen of those read 5.5 in. The other four split between 5.25 in and 5.0 in. The remaining three pages carry no spec block at all, which is a separate problem covered further down.

Not one of the nineteen reads 5.71 in. That figure is a real grip length, and catalog sheets quote it more often than brand pages do. The distance between the two numbers is 5.3 mm, small enough to look like rounding. It is not rounding at all, and the reason behind the gap changes what a brand writes on an RFQ.

A number that barely moves across nineteen listings

The first thing the table shows is that grip length does not follow price. The Agassi Champion 12 mm lists at USD 20.95, read on 24 October 2026, and carries 5.5 in of grip. The Perseus Pro V lists at USD 299.95 on the same day and carries the same 5.5 in.

Grip length does not follow weight either, which rules out mass as the variable that sets it. On the same 16.5 by 7.5 in body, average weight runs from 7.8 to 8.4 oz. All but one of those models reads 5.5 in of grip. Whatever sets that number, it is not the mass of the paddle or its place in the range.

A value that holds still across a fourteen-fold price span is usually a tooling value. The same holds across a 0.6 oz weight span, and the exceptions make that reading sharper rather than weaker.

One body, two grip lengths, and no note on either page

Scorpeus is the clean test, because three pages describe the same 16 by 8 in body. The Scorpeus Pro IV 16 mm and the Scorpeus 3S 14 mm both read 5.25 in. The 16 by 8 listing that reads 5.5 in is the Scorpeus 3S Dual 14 mm. Those pages describe one body, they disagree by a quarter inch, and neither explains the gap.

Two of the three carry a player’s name, with Collin Johns on the Pro IV and Anna Bright on the 3S. The largest departure from the rest of the line, 5.0 in, belongs to Tyson McGuffin’s Magnus 3S. An inference is available here and I want to label it as one. Player editions look like the place where a professional’s grip preference reaches the tooling.

Ben Johns is the case that weakens it, because his own Perseus edition keeps 5.5 in. His page changes the circumference instead, using a phrase worth quoting exactly: both with his preferred 4.250in grip circumference. Simone Jardim’s edition on the same listing is described as having a slimmer 4.125in grip.

JOOLA therefore treats circumference as the dimension a player adjusts. It treats length as the dimension the shape decides. The pages cannot confirm whether that is a written policy or an accumulated habit. They do confirm one thing: a single grip length and two circumferences for one model.

Why the outline cannot spare an inch

Two public rules and one piece of arithmetic carry the rest of the explanation. USA Pickleball caps total length at 17.00 in and caps length plus width at 24.00 in. JOOLA’s main shapes sit at exactly 24.00, from 16.5 plus 7.5 to 16 plus 8. Two older shapes in the table, Vision CGS and Seneca CDS, sit just under it.

Grip length and face length share a fixed total on a body like that. Every millimetre given to the handle therefore comes off the face. Adding grip without losing face area needs a longer paddle, and a longer paddle has to be narrower. At 17.00 in the width limit is 7.00 in, because 17.00 plus 7.50 breaks the 24.00 in sum rule. The longest legal shape is 17.00 by 7.00.

A grip length of 5.71 in is 145 mm, which is 5.3 mm more than 140 mm. On a 16.5 in body that request takes 5.3 mm away from the face. There is no unused length anywhere in the outline to give it back. That is why a brand page sits at 5.5 and a catalog sits at 5.71.

The decimal places come from a unit conversion

The origin of 5.71 is easier to state than to guess. Our own catalog quotes three grip lengths: 5.0, 5.5 and 5.71 in. The figures behind them are 127, 140 and 145 mm, because those are the pallet lengths we stock. Convert 145 mm to inches and the result is 5.7087, which rounds to 5.71.

Those two decimal places are not precision, and nobody converting the part meant them to be read that way. They are what a metric part looks like once someone describes it in inches. The reverse happens whenever an inch dimension is written in millimetres.

Circumference tells the same story with one useful exception. JOOLA’s 4.125 and 4.250 in come out at 104.8 and 108.0 mm. Those land almost exactly on the 105 and 108 mm diameters that handle suppliers stock as pallets. The 4.1875 in on the Magnus comes out at 106.4 mm, which is not a stock diameter. Something other than a standard pallet is happening there, and the page does not say which.

The number a brand copies into an RFQ may be an inch figure for a metric part. It may also be a genuine inch dimension that carries decimals for no reason. The two look identical on paper and behave differently in a quote.

What half an inch of wrap actually changes

Three quantities move when grip length changes, and they move by very different amounts. Numbers help here, because the quantity people worry about most turns out to be the smallest. The figures below are arithmetic from published dimensions rather than measurements of a paddle.

The lever is the first quantity, and it is the one a longer grip is sold on. A hand placed 4.0 in up from the butt leaves about 12.5 in of paddle above it. Choking up by the half inch between a 5.0 and a 5.5 in grip shortens that lever by 4 percent. That is the room a longer grip buys: the upper hand moves and the lower hand does not.

The balance point moves next, by less than most buyers expect. If the extra half inch of face is cut at the bottom of the hoop, about 7 g lands there. That point sits roughly 6 in from the butt. On a 227 g paddle balanced at 8.5 in, the balance point moves by less than 2 mm.

The wrap is where the real movement is. An overgrip 0.7 mm thick adds 4.4 mm to the circumference, because thickness counts twice around a circle. Two wraps add nearly 9 mm, against the 3.2 mm that separates a 105 mm pallet from a 108 mm one. The tape a customer adds is the larger variable in their hand.

The same tape also moves the balance more than the grip length does. Six grams at 2.75 in from the butt shifts the balance point by about 3.8 mm. Two wraps shift it by 7.3 mm. The arithmetic is worked through line by line in how a few grams at the handle move the balance point.

Three words where a tolerance should be

The grip circumference line on those pages carries an asterisk. The footnote reads *May vary slightly, which is the whole tolerance. There is no number, no measuring point, and no note on whether the figure covers a bare pallet or a wrap.

One page drops the unit from the line entirely. The Scorpeus 3S Dual 14 mm reads Grip Circumference*: 4.125 with nothing after the number. A person reading the page knows what is meant there, while a spreadsheet pulling the row does not.

Three of the 22 pages also publish no spec block at all. A buyer comparing the range has to fill those cells from somewhere else, and note where the figures came from. Our own product pages carry a summary table of the same kind, and a summary is what it is.

None of this is a criticism of one brand. It is what a spec block looks like when it is written for a shopper rather than for a purchase order. The buyers who need the numbers are the ones left guessing.

What to put on the RFQ instead

A tooling value cannot stay a sentence in a design brief. The five lines below stop the specification drifting between the first quote and the reorder. Each one is a figure a factory can answer without cutting a sample.

• Grip length in millimetres, measured from the butt cap to the upper edge of the wrap on a finished paddle.

• Pallet diameter in millimetres, before any tape goes on.

• Wrap type and thickness at which the circumference is quoted, since 0.7 mm of tape moves it more than a change of pallet does.

• Tolerance on both figures, in millimetres, with the measuring method written beside it.

• Clear wrap left below the throat, if the model is aimed at a two-handed backhand.

One question decides what a 5.3 mm change costs. It is whether the handle is a separate molded part or continuous with the body. That answer belongs in the same email as the five lines above.

If the handle is a separate pallet, the change lands on a part that can be cut on existing tooling. The manufacturer that molds the handle pallet can quote that change against a body it already presses. That is a question of days rather than of tooling.

If the handle is continuous with the body, the same half inch moves the cut pattern. A model already in production may need a new mold before a sample can be cut. That is the case where a request of 5.3 mm turns into a tooling line on the quote. It is worth knowing which case you are in before the drawing is approved.

Once the length is in millimetres, the last question becomes answerable. It is what the change costs against the body you already have. The manufacturer that cuts a handle to your length prices a pallet change on a sample or on a production body. The two prices are not the same.

A grip line that arrives in millimetres is a line a factory can answer. With a pallet diameter and a tolerance beside it, the answer usually arrives in one reply. The desk that quotes a handle length will also name the figures missing on your side. A brand that sends what it has, and names what it lacks, sees the gap before a sample is cut. The alternative is finding it afterwards.

FAQ

Does grip length change the swing weight?

Slightly, and by less than the same amount of length removed from the tip. On a 16.5 in body, the half inch between a 5.0 and a 5.5 in grip moves the balance point by roughly 2 mm, because the extra face material sits close to the hand. Taking 0.5 in off the tip of the same paddle moves it further, since the material being removed sits at the far end of the lever. A brand chasing a lower swing weight should start with the outline rather than with the handle.

Why does my paddle measure 5.25 in when the listing says 5.5 in?

The usual cause is a different measuring point. A quoted grip length normally runs from the butt cap to the upper edge of the wrap on a finished paddle. Measure a bare pallet, or measure to the base of the throat instead of the upper edge of the tape, and the figure moves by several millimetres either way. A compressed wrap shortens the visible length as well. Ask the supplier which of the three points its figure refers to before treating the gap as a defect.

Is 5.71 in a standard grip length?

It is a standard part and not a standard specification. A 145 mm pallet is stocked by most handle suppliers, and 5.71 in is that part converted into inches. It becomes a specification only when a brand decides to use it. On a 16.5 by 7.5 in body the 5.3 mm has to come out of the face or out of the width, because the outline already sits on the 24.00 in ceiling.

Do all JOOLA paddles use the same grip circumference?

No, and the pages show three figures: 4.125, 4.1875 and 4.250 in, which convert to 104.8, 106.4 and 108.0 mm. Two of those land on pallet diameters that factories stock, and one of them does not. That gap is worth raising with a supplier if the model matters to you. Two variants of one model can also differ, as the Pro V does, so the circumference belongs on the purchase order rather than in the product name.