Padel Courts for Hotels, Holiday Parks and Developers

Last updated October 2026

We build padel courts for hotels, golf and country clubs, holiday parks, landlords and developers across the UK, from a pair of courts beside the spa to an indoor centre in an empty warehouse. Our planning team handles the application and the use class case, and our noise and lighting consultants write the assessments. LTA figures from 2025 put one outdoor floodlit court at about £71,000 ex VAT and fees, and a covered court at about £166,000. Each court takes about a week to install once the base is in.

What you pay depends mostly on whether the courts are open, covered or inside a building.

Padel court costs for hotels, leisure sites and developers, UK, £ ex VAT and fees, 2025 to 2026

Option	Typical cost	Source
1 outdoor floodlit court, court and base	about £71,000	LTA 2025
2 outdoor floodlit courts	about £148,000	LTA 2025
1 covered court (court plus canopy)	about £166,000	LTA 2025 lines, our sum
Indoor court, excluding the building	£40,000 to £70,000 per court	UK Padel Guide, 13 Oct 2026
Indoor build compared with outdoor	50 to 100% higher	UK Padel Guide, 13 Oct 2026

These are typical published figures. The price for your hotel or development is confirmed after a site survey.

Can a hotel, golf club or holiday park add padel courts?

Yes, and councils are approving them. Shropshire Council granted permission on 4 July 2024 to turn three tennis courts at Lion Quays Resort, near Oswestry, into three padel courts with 3 to 4m glass and mesh screens and 6m lighting columns (ref 24/01806/FUL). Warwick District Council granted three padel courts with an enclosure, canopy, floodlighting, landscaping and sustainable drainage at The Warwickshire Golf and Country Club (ref W/25/1242), with no objection from the parish council.

In heritage settings, start with pre-application advice, as Rudding Park in Harrogate did with North Yorkshire Council and Historic England for four covered courts.

Can padel go into a new development, retail park or empty unit?

Yes. Councils have approved padel on car parks, retail parks and vacant industrial units, often on a temporary permission:

• Peterborough: four covered floodlit courts in the garden centre car park at Peterborough One Retail Park, approved 3 October 2025.
• Leeds: indoor padel courts, a pilates studio and a bar in a vacant former industrial unit at Dolly Lane, Burmantofts, granted full permission on 3 September 2026.
• Croydon: nine enclosed courts in six temporary structures at 1-5 Addiscombe Road, as a meanwhile use for up to ten years.
• Sheffield: fourteen indoor courts at Parkway Close, approved as a five-year temporary scheme with 96 parking spaces required first.
• Newcastle: three outdoor floodlit courts at Stephenson Quarter, near Central Station, on a temporary permission to May 2028.

See temporary padel courts for how meanwhile permissions work.

What drives the cost of turning an empty building into a padel centre?

The building. The courts themselves are £40,000 to £70,000 each before any building work, according to the UK Padel Guide; clear height, floor, lighting, heating and fire safety decide the rest.

The LTA sets a minimum clear height of 6m over the court and recommends 8m for new buildings. Four courts side by side need an enclosure of 20.80m by 45.3m. Indoor glass is 10mm toughened, against 12mm outdoors, and fully enclosed structures need building control approval. The indoor padel centre page covers conversions in detail.

Which planning use class does padel fall into?

Indoor padel falls in Use Class E(d) and outdoor courts generally in F2(c), according to law firm Freeths (May 2026). Indoor courts may need a town centre sequential test; outdoor courts generally do not. Converting an industrial or warehouse unit is likely to be a material change of use.

Employment land is where warehouse schemes win or lose. Manchester City Council refused eight indoor courts in a Strangeways warehouse for loss of employment land in 2026. Birmingham City Council approved eight indoor courts in a 29,000 sq ft warehouse at Flaxley Parkway, Stetchford, in January 2026. Our planning team checks the local plan’s employment policies before you sign a lease.

How do we keep court noise away from guest rooms and homes?

By where the court goes and which way it faces. Research by MW Acoustics, reported in September 2025, found padel about 6 dB louder than tennis at the side of the court but almost the same at the glass end, so the open sides should face away from bedrooms and neighbours. The LTA advises noise and light surveys wherever homes are within 50m.

Distance and barriers decide the rest: Bath refused a scheme with homes 3.5m away, while Alderley Edge was approved with a 3.2m barrier. Our acoustic consultants model your layout first. More on padel court planning permission.

Open courts or covered courts for a hotel?

Covered courts can be played in any weather, which suits guests booked for a fixed weekend, but they cost more and face a tougher planning test. A canopy adds about £95,000 per court on the LTA figures, needs planning approval and may need building control.

In the Green Belt, canopies are often the sticking point: Barnet approved a scheme only once its canopies were removed (25/3670/FUL). See padel court canopy for heights, design life and costs.

What’s included

• Site check and layout around your buildings, guest rooms and neighbours
• Pre-application advice, the planning application and design and access statement, with noise and lighting assessments from our consultants
• Use class and sequential test advice for indoor and empty-unit schemes
• Groundworks: the ring beam, sub-base, drainage and cable ducts
• Courts, turf, floodlights and canopies
• Ask us about a programme planned around your bookings or development timetable

What’s not included

• Building works to a warehouse or unit, such as heating, toilets and fire upgrades, unless quoted separately
• Planning, building control and council fees
• Court booking systems, staffing and operation
• VAT, shown separately on every quote

Illustrative example

Built only from the LTA 2025 figures in the table above. Not a real hotel or site.

A hotel adds two outdoor floodlit courts beside its leisure club for about £148,000 ex VAT and fees. A year later it covers one of them; the LTA one-court canopy line is about £95,000, bringing the total to about £243,000. Both stages need planning permission, so the first application shows where the canopy will go.

Who does the work

Padel Court Build is a SustainPlan Ltd service. Your general manager or development director deals with one team, which includes architects, planning consultants, sustainability assessors and installers. Our planning consultants handle use class and the application, our specialist acoustic consultants write the noise impact assessment, and our installers build the base, courts and lights.

Often needed alongside

• Temporary padel courts: meanwhile use on plots and empty units
• Indoor padel centre: warehouse and building conversions
• Padel court canopy: covered outdoor courts
• Padel court cost: every line of the budget

Related guides: padel club business plan and padel court funding.

FAQs

How long would courts take to build at a working hotel?

On the UK Padel Guide’s timings, groundworks run 3 to 5 weeks per phase and each court then goes up in about a week. Ask us about planning the noisy work around your bookings.

Can a landlord put courts in an empty warehouse for a few years?

Yes. Sheffield granted five years and Croydon up to ten; each council decides case by case.

Will padel courts suit a holiday park?

Yes, with the courts set away from lodges and caravans and the open sides facing away; a noise assessment confirms the layout.

Sources

• Cost table, clear heights, footprint, glass, 50m survey advice: LTA Padel Court Construction Guidance Note 2025 and LTA Padel Court Data Sheet (read 17 Oct 2026)
• Indoor costs: UK Padel Guide, 13 Oct 2026 (secondary)
• Use class, sequential test: Freeths, 26 May 2026; floodlights and change of use: Nexa Law, 1 May 2026 (secondary)
• Lion Quays: Shropshire Star, 6 Jul 2024; Warwickshire Golf and Country Club: Leek Wootton and Guy’s Cliffe Parish Council, 11 Sep 2025; Rudding Park: ruddingpark.co.uk (all read 17 Oct 2026)
• Peterborough: Peterborough Telegraph, 6 Oct 2025; Leeds: Yorkshire Evening Post, 5 Sep 2026
• Croydon: news.croydon.gov.uk; Sheffield: The Star, 9 Feb 2026; Newcastle: Place North East, 3 Jun 2025
• Manchester: Place North West, 29 Jul 2026; Birmingham: Place Midlands, Jan 2026
• Noise: MW Acoustics research via The Padel Paper, 11 Sep 2025; Alderley Edge: alderleyedge.com, 27 Jun 2026; Bath: BathNES minutes
• Barnet: Freeths, 26 May 2026