How to Create a Pickleball Club

Starting a pickleball club in Pikel takes about a minute, and it's the foundation for everything else — invites, recurring games, round robins, chat. A club is really just your crew with a home: a name, a place you play, and a front door you control. Here's exactly how to set one up.

Step 1 — Open the Clubs tab and tap +

Head to the Clubs tab and tap the + button in the corner (if you haven't joined any clubs yet, there's a Create Club button waiting on the empty screen too). That opens the Create Club form.

Step 2 — Name your club and make it yours

Give your club a name — the Club Name field is required. While you're here you can add an optional club photo and a short description so members recognize it at a glance. None of that is required; the name is enough to get going.

Step 3 — Choose who can join

Every club can be found in club search (the Games tab's Clubs lens). What you choose here is who can walk straight in:

• Public — anyone who finds the club can join instantly, and so can anyone with your invite. Best for community groups and open drop-in crews.
• Private — a stranger who finds the club has to send a join request for you to approve — but anyone you hand a link, QR code, or join code still joins instantly. Best for a facility or a members-only crew you invite directly.

You can change it later in Edit Club.

The same form has Allow Member Invites (on by default), which lets members invite others, and Default RSVP Opens, when new games in the club open for RSVPs.

Heads up: picking Private doesn't screen the people you invite — invite joins stay instant by default. To make every join wait for your OK, flip on Require approval to join in Edit Club after you create it (it's a separate switch, off by default). You can change any of this later.

Step 4 — Set your default venue

Pick a default venue — the courts your club calls home. This one's required alongside the name, and for good reason: new games you create default to this venue, so you're not re-typing the location every week. Don't see your courts in the list? Search for them right in the picker. And if you move or add a location down the road, you can update it later.

Step 5 — Tap Create Club

Hit Create Club and Pikel shows "(your club) is live" with two buttons: Share invite link and Go to club. You're automatically set as the club's owner with full admin control — no separate "make me the admin" step.

From here, the single highest-leverage move is to invite people: every club comes with a shareable link, a QR code, and a short join code. Everything else lives behind the gear on the club page: Edit Club, the Approval Queue, DUPR Link, payouts and member nudges.

Then create your first game so there's something on the calendar for new members to show up to.

Pro tip

Decide public vs private based on who can find you, not who you'll let in. If you want maximum growth, go public — anyone who finds you can join on the spot. If you run a facility or a fixed roster, go private so strangers who find you have to request in — and if you want to screen everyone, including people you invite, turn on Require approval to join in Edit Club. You can flip any of it later, so start with whichever gets people playing soonest.