Luxury brands have moved into padel hard since 2022, and the pace has quickened in 2026. Rolex, Audemars Piguet, Hublot and Richard Mille now back the world’s top players. Prada and Versace sell four-figure rackets. Valentino took over a Dubai padel club for a fortnight, and Dunhill runs an invite-only tournament at London’s Hurlingham Club. The pattern is clear. Padel has replaced golf as the sport luxury chases. Last updated: May 2026.
In this article
- Why luxury picked padel
- The watch wars: Rolex, Audemars Piguet, Hublot, Richard Mille
- Fashion houses on court: Prada, Versace, Valentino
- Dunhill and the Hurlingham Padel Classic
- Premium sportswear’s quiet land grab
- What it means for the rest of us
- Luxury brands in padel FAQ
Why luxury picked padel
Padel sits at a rare commercial sweet spot. The sport has more than 35 million players across 150+ countries (per the FIP World Padel Report 2025), and Playtomic‘s Global Padel Report 2025 counted around 7,000 new courts built in 2024 alone. That growth attracts brands. The audience attracts luxury brands.
A round of padel in Manhattan or Mayfair runs $80 to $150 a court, often more at members’ clubs. The people booking those courts are, by definition, the people who buy four-figure watches and five-figure handbags.
That makes padel one of the most efficient ways to put a logo in front of a high-net-worth audience right now.
There’s also a visual point. A padel court is glass, turf and clean lines. Camera angles are tight, branding placements are uncluttered, and players spend long stretches stationary at the back wall. Compared with the chaos of a football pitch or a golf fairway, it’s the kind of stage luxury houses can actually control.
The watch wars: Rolex, Audemars Piguet, Hublot and Richard Mille
Watchmakers got in early, but the last twelve months have changed the picture entirely. Padel now has the same quartet of luxury watch sponsors that golf and tennis have spent decades cultivating, and the deals are stacking up faster than the courts.
Rolex × Arturo Coello (January 2026)
This was the deal that confirmed padel had arrived. In January 2026, Rolex signed world number one Arturo Coello as its first ever padel ambassador. He joined a roster that includes Roger Federer, Carlos Alcaraz, Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus.
For Rolex, signing a padel player at all is a statement, since the brand only adds athletes when it believes a sport has reached lasting cultural weight.
Audemars Piguet × Agustin Tapia + Premier Padel (May 2026)
Just months after Rolex moved, Audemars Piguet announced a dual deal in May 2026. The Le Brassus watchmaker became official timekeeper of the Qatar Airways Premier Padel Tour and signed Agustin Tapia, Coello’s partner and the other half of the world’s top pair, as a personal ambassador.
Court clocks and select branded elements will appear at all 25-plus tournaments across 17 countries during the 2026 season.
The timing matters. Two of the world’s most exclusive watchmakers signing the world’s two best players within four months of each other is not coincidence. It’s a sector-wide bet.
Hublot × Ale Galan (since 2022)
Hublot got there first. The brand signed Ale Galan as a “Friend of the Brand” in November 2022, when he was finishing his third consecutive year as world number one. Hublot was already deep in football, tennis and motorsport. Padel slotted in cleanly, and Galan still wears a Big Bang on court.
Richard Mille × Fernando Belasteguin (since 2023)
Richard Mille beat Rolex to a padel signing by years. The brand brought in Fernando Belasteguin, the sport’s GOAT, in 2023. Bela was world number one for 16 consecutive seasons, from 2002 to 2017, and won 230 of 286 finals he contested.
He is most often photographed wearing the RM 35-03 Automatic Rafael Nadal, partly because Nadal is his hero, partly because the colours match the Argentine flag. Richard Mille has since hosted padel experiences in Monaco featuring Belasteguin alongside polo prodigy Poroto Cambiaso.
Fashion houses on court: Prada, Versace and Valentino
The fashion side of luxury has taken a different route. Rather than sign players, the maisons have built product. Three of Italy’s biggest houses now sell padel pieces or have run padel activations, and the prices reflect the market they’re aiming at.
| Brand | Padel product or activation | Price / detail |
|---|---|---|
| Prada | Re-Nylon Padel Racket (black, red triangle logo) | $1,700 / €1,700, weight 360g, Re-Nylon case from recycled ocean plastic |
| Versace | Versace Allover Padel Set (1 racket, 3 balls, case) | Around €1,600, 100% carbon frame, 360g |
| Valentino | Matcha Club Dubai takeover, branded courts and tournament | 16 February to 1 March 2024 |
Prada’s Re-Nylon racket
Prada launched its all-black padel racket in early 2025, sold direct on prada.com with a Re-Nylon case made from recycled ocean plastic. At $1,700, it sits roughly four to five times above the price of a top professional racket like the Adidas Metalbone Galan plays with.
Early reviewers describe the build quality as solid, but nobody’s buying this to win a club tournament. It’s a statement piece, full stop.
Versace Allover Padel Set
Versace took the gift-set route. The Allover Padel Set wraps a 100 per cent carbon frame in the house’s signature print, includes three branded balls and a logo case, and lands at roughly €1,600. Versace has also released a separate La Vacanza paddle racket aimed at the beach crowd, with butterflies and ladybugs on a fibreglass frame.
Valentino’s Dubai takeover
Valentino didn’t sell rackets. The maison rented Dubai’s most fashion-forward club instead. From 16 February to 1 March 2024, Maison Valentino took over Matcha Club in Al Quoz with branded courts, branded balls and a Valentino tournament on 29 February.
The Spring/Summer 2024 collection was on sale courtside. It was, as luxury activations go, a near-perfect fit. Matcha is already one of the most photographed padel clubs in Dubai. Valentino simply borrowed it.
Dunhill and the Hurlingham Padel Classic
The British contribution is the most quintessentially British thing imaginable: a black-tie pro-am at one of West London’s most storied private members’ clubs. Alfred Dunhill became title sponsor of the inaugural Padel Classic at The Hurlingham Club in May 2024, and the event has run every year since. The third edition is scheduled for 13 and 14 May 2026.
The format pairs corporates and celebrities with padel professionals across 16 teams. Past participants include Sir Andrew Strauss, Michael Vaughan, James Anderson, Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill, Jamie Redknapp, Judy Murray, Greg Rusedski, George Gregan and Bryan Habana. Pros on the bill have included British number one Aimee Gibson and former world champion Miguel Lamperti.
The 2025 edition added a properly Bond-villain detail: a floating padel court built above Hurlingham’s lake, the first of its kind in the UK. Money raised goes to Laureus Sport for Good and the Hurlingham Club Foundation.
Dunhill’s logic is straightforward, since the brand has positioned itself around British country-club life since Alfred Dunhill’s earliest days in motoring kit. Padel, for them, is just the next chapter of the same story.
Premium sportswear’s quiet land grab
Outside the watchmakers and the maisons, premium sportswear has been moving fast. The deal that surprised the sport most was On Running signing Coello in January 2026, days before the Rolex announcement.
On is the Swiss running brand Roger Federer invested in back in 2019, and Coello is its first padel signing. The collaboration is already underway, with the first padel-specific On shoes due in summer 2027.
The pattern is becoming familiar. A player keeps their racket sponsor, then splits clothing and footwear off to a premium technical brand. Coello stays with Head for rackets and adds On for kit.
Mike Yanguas and Coki Nieto did similar deals with Asics. Galan, separately, fronts Giorgio Armani’s Acqua di Gio fragrance, which is a cleaner read on padel as a lifestyle category than as a hardware market.
Wilson, meanwhile, became the official ball supplier of Premier Padel in 2024 and has pushed deeper into padel rackets and footwear of its own. That is not a luxury move, but it tells you how seriously the wider premium market is taking the sport.
What it means for the rest of us
None of these deals matter to your Saturday morning game. You don’t need a Prada racket to play padel well, and a Rolex contract isn’t going to fix your bandeja.
What it does mean is that the sport is now, properly, embedded in the lifestyle category that brands chase hardest. That brings money in. More tournament prize pools. More broadcast investment. Better facilities at the clubs that get partnership deals.
It also means the kind of clubs we list on Padeli are going to keep getting better. When a maison takes over a club for two weeks, the bar gets raised for everyone.
Lighting, surfaces, café standards, member experience. The padel boom started bottom-up, with players building courts wherever they could find space. The luxury layer arriving on top is what makes it stick.
If you want to see where the next deals will land, watch the next world number one. Coello and Tapia are 23 and 26. Whoever climbs to displace them is already being scouted by a brand whose logo isn’t on a court yet.
Luxury brands in padel FAQ
Which luxury watch brands sponsor padel players?
How much does a Prada padel racket cost?
Did Valentino really take over a padel club in Dubai?
What is the Alfred Dunhill Padel Classic?
Why are so many luxury brands signing padel deals now?
Will more luxury brands sign padel ambassadors?
Sources
Reporting on the Rolex × Coello and Audemars Piguet × Tapia deals is drawn from Sportico, Padel Addict, Luxury Daily and Sportcal coverage from January and May 2026. Hublot and Richard Mille details are from official brand communications and La Cote des Montres. Pricing for the Prada and Versace rackets is taken from the brands’ direct retail listings. The Alfred Dunhill Padel Classic detail comes from the official tournament site, TTB Sport and The Padel Paper. The Valentino × Matcha Club takeover is sourced from Valentino’s experience archive and Fact Magazine Dubai. Player data is taken from Padel FIP. Player count and court growth figures are from the International Padel Federation and Playtomic’s Global Padel Report 2025.
