How Many Calories Do You Burn in Cardio Tennis?

Cardio Tennis is a heart pumping, fun way of burning calories. For a competitive singles tennis game, the average person burns 575-775 calories per hour. If they are hitting balls in non-competitive play, the average person will burn 350-500 calories per hour.

The number of calories you are burning during an hour of tennis can help you stay on track with to your fitness goals. For all 3,500 calories that you burn you can lose 0.5kg of weight. Knowing this can be especially willing to help if you are trying to lose, gain or preserve your current weight. Healthy weight loss occurs at a rate of 0.5 to 1kg per week. You can use the number of calories you burn during an hour of tennis to meet your physical activity levels for the day.

Tennis is a good way to burn calories and have fun while doing it. You may find other activities that burn calories, are not as enjoyable. For example, the amount of calories burned running are probably the same as tennis, but a lot of people would rank ranking low on their enjoyment scale. It’s something people do, but not many enjoy.

Apple and Tennis ball next to each other for calorie portion control

Calories Burned Playing Tennis

The amount of calories burned playing tennis in groups lessons or match play is dependent on a few variables, such as whether you are playing doubles or singles and your weight. Emma Bryce from Ted Ed explain what a calorie is and what factors determine the different factors that go into calculating calories burned and needs (video above).

All data below is from the Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise journal, the certified journal of the American college of Sports Medicine.

Calories Burned Playing Tennis Doubles

If you weigh around 60kg: 354 calories burned playing tennis per hour
If you weigh around 70kg: 422 calories burned per hour
If you weigh around 80kg: 490 calories burned per hour
If you weigh around 90kg: 558 calories burned per hour

Calories Burned Playing Tennis Singles

If you weigh around 60kg: 472 calories burned playing tennis per hour
If you weigh around 70kg: 563 calories burned per hour
If you weigh around 80kg: 654 calories burned per hour
If you weigh around 90kg: 745 calories burned per hour

In addition, there are so many other benefits you gain from tennis. It engages your whole body for a muscle-toning workout. As you run, lunge and hit the ball you use your legs, abs, shoulders, arms, back and chest muscles. Playing tennis can also boost your cardiovascular endurance and make it easier for you to engage in other activities without getting tired as quickly. So as you can see from the above suggestion, you generally burn more calories in singles tennis matches than doubles. Whether you want to on your own for singles or with a partner in doubles, tennis is a fantastic way to stay active and healthy.