Wowlly SST Carbonized Foam Core

What it is

The SST is Wowlly's 16mm carbonized-foam paddle: 8.0-8.1 oz, an elongated 16.5" x 7.5" face, 5.75" handle and 12K T700 raw-carbon surface. HK$1,599, USA Pickleball approved since July 2025.

How it plays

The feedback from our player panel was unusually consistent, and it was not quite the paddle Wowlly markets. The brand leads on explosive power; players led on feel. The word that kept coming back was muted: a soft contact with real dwell, the ball sitting on the face long enough to shape dinks and soft play deliberately. Control and stability were reported as consistent across the face rather than concentrated in a narrow sweet spot.

The comfort story is the strongest single theme. Low vibration, and specifically less wrist and elbow fatigue across long rallies. For anyone managing an arm, that is the reason to look at this paddle.

The power is real, but it arrives second. Players described explosive rebound on baseline drives once they had adjusted to the foam feel, which is the usual foam-core learning curve and worth knowing before you buy. It is also noticeably quieter than older carbon paddles.

The published specs

Wowlly publishes a swing weight of 84, twist weight of 7.5 and balance point of 9.53 inches. No independent lab has run its own numbers on this paddle yet, so those are the brand's figures rather than measured ones.

What we still don't know

Long-term durability. Wowlly is a newer brand, so the owner record for the SST is still building, so it is worth registering the six-month warranty inside the 14-day window. We score it above the honeycomb DBS 2.0 on construction grounds: core crush is the failure mode that eventually catches up with thermoformed honeycomb paddles, and a foam core sidesteps it. Foam has its own long-run question, whether it softens and goes dead over a season, and nobody has an answer for this one yet.

Spin is the other gap: no player raised it and nobody has run measured spin testing on this paddle, so treat the raw-carbon face's grip as unproven rather than good or bad.

HK reality

At HK$1,599 the SST is the cheapest foam-core paddle purchasable in Hong Kong, roughly a third below the premium foam benchmarks (CRBN TruFoam Genesis around US$280, Gearbox Pro Ultimate around US$275). It is available to order direct from Wowlly now, in HKD, with no import wait and a warranty route that doesn't cross an ocean. Code DINKSTART takes 15% off at checkout, which brings it to about HK$1,359.