Balance point

Balance is where the racket's mass concentrates along its length, quoted low, medium, or high, sometimes as millimeters from the butt of the handle. Two rackets can weigh an identical 365 grams and feel nothing alike, because the scale reads total mass and your wrist reads where that mass sits. Balance is the spec the scale hides.

Low, medium, high

Low balance keeps the mass near the handle. The head feels light, so it accelerates and changes direction quickly: faster hands at the net, easier corrections when the ball clips a wall and does something rude. It is also the geometry that loads the elbow least, since less mass is levering against the joint on every impact. The cost is punch. With little mass behind the contact, the smash relies on your swing speed alone.

High balance moves the mass toward the tip. Now the head carries momentum into the ball, and a smash or a bandeja arrives heavier for the same swing. Everything between the smashes gets slower: the volley exchange, the reaction block, the late adjustment. The same leverage that powers the overhead works against the elbow, which is why head-heavy rackets show up so often in conversations about arm pain. Medium (or even) balance is the compromise, and most teardrop rackets live there.

Reading the number

When brands publish a figure, it is the distance from the butt cap to the point where the racket balances on a finger, typically somewhere around 250 to 280 mm. Lower numbers mean handle-heavy, higher numbers head-heavy, and a few millimeters is genuinely feelable. Overgrips shift it too: each one adds mass at the handle and pulls the balance down slightly, which is the cheapest balance tuning available.

Balance tracks shape closely, round rackets running low and diamonds high, but the pairing is a convention rather than a law. A low-balance teardrop exists and is a lovely thing. Check the number instead of assuming it from the outline.