How to run a pickleball ladder on Pickleheads

If you want competitive pickleball games without committing to a full league season, a ladder is the move.

A ladder is an ongoing series of pickleball sessions where players start on courts with others at a similar level. After each session, players move up or down “steps” on the ladder based on their results.

Show up often and win, and you’ll climb. And if you miss a week, you don’t sink the whole system—your spot will still make sense the next time you play.

Ladders are popular because they strike the right balance: tight, fair matchups with drop-in flexibility. They’re less commitment than a league but still give players that satisfying sense of progression.

If you’re deciding between the two, check out our guide on how to run a league on Pickleheads for a season-style alternative.

Ready to run one? Our Ladder Template does the heavy lifting for you — tracking steps and seeding your next session automatically.

A ladder keeps partners and opponents in a tight skill band, which means more exciting games, fewer blowouts, and players who come back week after week.

Here are the big wins:

A ladder on Pickleheads works best if you do a little homework beforehand. Here are the key steps to take before heading out to the court.

Decide how often you’ll run ladder sessions. Weekly is the sweet spot for momentum without organizer burnout. Share the cadence in your event description so players can plan around it.

You’ll run each ladder night in the Pickleheads Round Robin Tool. We highly recommend that you use the Up & Down the River format. This format moves in rounds, where each round involves 3-4 games with players shuffling between partners on their particular court. By the end of the round, every player will have partnered with every other player on that court.

After each round, winners move up a court and losers move down – you can choose if you want one player to move up and down or two each time. New matchups are generated in the next round accordingly.

You can also choose the Claim the Throne format, in which players move up or down after each game.

Every ladder session will be its own session in Pickleheads. Laying these out up front keeps players organized and boosts turnout.

Create a repeating series using a clear naming pattern like “Ladder – Week 1,” “Ladder – Week 2,” and so on. Then lock in the basics before you invite players - times, locations, etc.

Once you’ve created the sessions in Pickleheads, we recommend that you keep your ladder roster in a group or list and invite that pool to each session.

For the First Session only, give players a reasonable starting order in the app. Use DUPR if you have it, self-ratings, or your own judgment. Session 1 builds everyone’s starting step in the template, which fuels accurate seeding from that point forward.

With that out of the way, you’re ready to play.

This is the easiest part. Your first ladder night is a simple round robin using the Up & Down the River format.

The rules are simple, but designed to keep things moving. We recommend that you have teams win by one rather than two, to speed up close games. If you have uneven player number, have courts of 4 players play to 15 and courts of 5 play to 11 to control timing. Generate rounds, play, and collect scores in the app.

When play wraps, tap Email me the results. You can find this in any tab of your round robin results in the Pickleheads app. The CSV goes straight to your inbox and becomes your single source of truth for that session.

Open your copy of the Ladder League Template. In the Session 1 tab, paste the CSV data starting at cell A2 in the blue input area. Don’t overwrite orange cells—those are formulas that power the standings.

After you paste, the sheet assigns every player a starting step based on their final position from the First Session. Think of their initial step as the rung they’d occupy if you played one more round with the same crowd.

Next, you’ll set up Session 2 (S2) in Pickleheads. From your player list, export names by clicking on “print” on the session page on the web.

Then paste these names into the Session Seeder (blue columns) in the template. The sheet looks up each player’s current step and tells you where to start them. It also flags new players so you can place them sensibly. We use point differential as a secondary tie breaker to manage the standings and seeding. You're likely to have many players on a certain step.

Back in the app, drag players to the appropriate starting courts to match the seeding. For newcomers, aim for the middle courts unless you’re confident they’re well above or below the group.

Play Session 2, export the results, and paste into the Session 2 tab. Repeat that same rhythm every time: run → export → paste into the matching Session X tab.

From Session 2 onward, the sheet updates each player’s current Step automatically by adding their Step change (how far they moved during the session) to their previous Step. You’ll see fresh standings the moment you paste.

If a new player appears in a results file, just paste like normal. The template benchmarks their outcome against the average Step of the courts they played to assign a fair starting Step. No manual cleanup required.

Need to correct an initial placement? Use Manual Step Assignment to override a player’s starting step (exact name match required). You can also set a step floor to keep nobody from dropping below a minimum—handy for large groups where motivation matters.

Open the Standings tab, screenshot, and post in your event chat the same night. Players love to see movement up the ladder—it keeps them coming back.

Keep this section handy—these little habits save headaches later.

If you’ve wanted competitive, ongoing play without drowning in admin, this is your path. Run the night in the app, paste the CSV, and let Steps keep matchups tight—even when players come and go.