Beyond Measure Ronin Review: Built for Tennis Converts?

Beyond Measure is a newer brand — less than a year old, growing, and they even have their own team in Vietnam.

They sent over their Ronin — gen 3, all-court, and apparently the people overseas really like it.

Let's see how it plays.

Intro

My name is Pickle Li. I'm a 5.0 pickleball player and I've reviewed over 50 paddles on this channel. I created MyPickleList, which does community-driven paddle ratings, and there are currently over 1,000 ratings.

Caveats & Disclosures

Reminder: This is a first impressions review, not a full long-term review.

I played with this for around 4–5 days, so I can't speak to long-term durability.

It is gen 3, so it hypothetically will eventually core crush. When speaking with the owner, he said his did not core crush after 6+ months — which would be very durable for a gen 3.

I'll be rating this on MyPickleList at the end of this write-up, so stay tuned for that.

Shout out to Beyond Measure for sending this over.

Quick Specs Overview

The Beyond Measure Ronin is a gen 3 all-court paddle. The difference: they use 8mm honeycomb, not the typical 10mm.

• Thickness: 16mm
• Shapes: elongated, hybrid, widebody (all three)

I'm more of a widebody and hybrid guy — that's what I picked.

• Widebody weight: 8.0 oz
• Hybrid weight: 8.1 oz

The owner said the paddle needs additional weight. On the widebody I used 3g at 3 and 9.

There's also a longer break-in period due to the smaller cell size.

On-Court First Impressions

Pop

Above average — overall on the poppier side even though it's advertised as all-court.

It could stand its ground in fire fights against power paddles. More pop-forward than power-forward.

Control & Feel

Not my favorite for my preferences.

If you follow my channel, you've heard this before: I enjoy a more linear pop-to-power ratio — if a paddle is very powerful, I want the pop to correlate, and if it's less powerful, I want less pop. Most paddles fall on that general line.

When I play paddles with a lot of pop but not the same level of power, I struggle adjusting. The Ronin falls in that category.

Feel: Very poppy and stiff off the face. Softens a bit as it breaks in. I preferred the broken-in widebody vs the brand-new hybrid — not a drastic difference, just a bit softer.

It's also a bit more muted, and with the pop/power ratio I'm not accustomed to, it was harder to tell how far the ball was going without maining or drilling with it a bunch.

Sweet spot: Not the best — maybe average — a noticeable step down coming off paddles with good sweet spots recently.

With all that, I had trouble with drops and resets honestly. I didn't enjoy it much the first couple days in stock form.

After adding weight and breaking it in, control and feel did improve.

Grit: Very slightly above average out of the box — felt like normal new-paddle grit, not long-lasting grit.

Spin: Average out of the box — wasn't getting stuff to insanely dip. With weight + break-in, spin got better — lots of dip on drives, probably helped by the all-court firepower.

Where I really enjoyed it: Off-the-bounce speedups and closer-range speedups. Because of that all-court firepower, the ball stays in a lot more — those shots felt good.

Power

All-court level — a lot of my overheads and balls that usually ended points didn't anymore; often needed an extra shot to finish.

Serves and returns were still OK. Drives in terms of effectiveness were maybe better — they stayed in easier.

Verdict & MyPickleList

MyPickleList is a site I built for community-driven paddle ratings — a quick way to see how a paddle stacks up without reading long reviews. We have 300+ members and 1,000+ ratings; more ratings make it better, so please join if you haven't.

If you're in the Atlanta area, Premier Racquet Sports in Dunwoody is running $20 gift cards when you rate and comment on 5 paddles on the site.

Back to the review.

When I spoke with the owner, he said his goal was a more controllable paddle for people coming from tennis. I do think it fits that archetype — players who may not need extra power and want their balls to stay in.

The Ronin has good pop to hang with power paddles in fire fights, but power is more all-court level — drives stay in and can dip.

That said, I'm not that archetype. Generating power is probably the weakest part of my game, so the paddle didn't play into my strengths and preferences.

In stock form before break-in, I'd say 6–7/10 — a lot of paddles I'd have preferred. There are so many great paddles out right now; not calling this a bad paddle.

With weight and break-in, it definitely helps in all areas.

Rating: 7/10 (Ronin — with weight + break-in)

My favorite thing: speedups off the bounce — they stayed in pretty often.

Solid paddle with weight, but not my personal preference.

Good fit if you want all-court firepower that stays in on drives/speedups, and you like a stiffer, poppier feel. All-court gen 3 paddles are more rare nowadays.

With the 8mm cell size and longer break-in, I'd guess it could be a bit more durable than most gen 3 paddles.

Thanks for reading. Join the MyPickleList community on site and Discord — we talk paddles, gear, and pickleball tips daily. If you caught this as a video too, like and subscribe there; it helps a lot. See you next time.

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