Top 10 Professional Table Tennis Blades – Excellent Quality

Today, I explain to you how to choose the best table tennis blade. This tutorial is based on my several years of training, playing and coaching. I also have some occasions to discuss this topic “How to choose the best blade and rubber” with some Chinese coaches.

You will learn:

1. How to choose the right blades for your styles
2. Top 10 professional table tennis blade

I will help you choose the right blade and then combine with the best forehand rubber, and the best backhand rubber. This combination should fit your playing style.

Understand the function of a blade

The table tennis racket is made by the blade and the rubbers. The main difference between Chinese philosophy and Western philosophy about the racket is Speed and Spin.

Chinese coach says “The blade should be an extension of your hand”. The blade gives you the feeling, and that’s the blade will help you “SPIN” the ball.

While some Western coaches emphasize the “Speed” behavior of the blade. So in general, Western players will choose OFF, OFF+ blade to gain speed, and combine with softer rubber. While in China, players prefer OFF- blade, and play with very hard rubbers.

I’ve tried and played with both combination “Fast blade + Soft rubber” and “Flexible blade + Hard Rubber”. And I can confirm with you, the latter setup will help you “Improve faster!”.

If you are still confused, read my own experiences in coaching young and beginner players!

How to choose the best table tennis blade

In all of the equipment in table tennis, I would say the blade is the most important one! You know that the rackets are made by the blade and the rubbers.

The composition of a racket: one blade and 2 rubbers

Table Tennis Blade is the wooden part of the racket.

The blade is considered the soul of your playing style. Defender, Allround, Offensive players choose a different type of blade.

Choosing the right blade is crucial in table tennis because the blade decide:

• 80% of your playing style. Rubber decides only 20%
• give you the best feeling when you touch the ball
• give you the ability to spin, or to accelerate the speed of your shots (due to dwell-time)
• provide the kick effect (the first speed of the bounce) based on the stiffness of the outer layer
• the main power for your shots when you play far from the table

Liu Guoliang once said:

“Table tennis blade should be an extend of your hand“, said by Chinese National Team Head coach

That’s the reason that you should focus on your blade! Choose the highest quality possible!

So if you can investigate 120$ for your racket, spend about 80$ for the blade, and 20$ for the rubber (2 sides cost 40$).

What is a high-quality table tennis blade

The high-quality blade is not the cheap and mass production one. It’s the premium quality professional bat made by the experienced maker.

Best table tennis blade offers more spin and crisper feeling during ball contact.

It is the key to increase your potential of winning. So focus on the quality blade which matches your playing style.

Remember, a good racket can make the same spin with a shorter stroke than the low-quality racket.

Viscaria (check price/ order online/ read review) is considered one of the very good blade in table tennis. It provides a good balance between “Speed”, and “Spin”. The “spin” quality is good. (This is the word of Zhang Jike during an interview).

While Butterfly racket has a huge market in the US, and Europe (because they are faster, and harder). Stiga racket is preferred in China. Fan Zhendong’s current racket is the Stiga Infinity VPS (custom handle) (check price/ read review/ order online).

There are many reasons:

• The good relationship between Stiga and the Chinese National Team
• Stiga racket is in general cheaper than Butterfly blade
• Chinese players prefer the “good old day of feeling” from Stiga blade
• Stiga racket is somehow more flexible than Butterfly blade
• Stiga racket in general used “Ayous” outer-plie. While Butterfly prefers using “Koto outer-plie”.

But nowadays, with the “New Trends In Table Tennis”, players tend to play with harder, and faster racket to deal with the plastic ball. Search on my site “New Trends” to learn about this modern tendency in table tennis.

If you want to keep one racket from the beginning to a very high level, you can stick with the Stiga racket.

• Chinese Rubber vs European Rubber
• The Truth about Chinese Rubbers | Ma Long Forehand Rubber
• DHS Hurricane 3 Rubber: Boosted or Not?

What are the characteristics of a good blade

Yes, we want the highest quality blade! But how to know which one has the top-notch quality. There are many things about a good blade, I will make a PingSunday video and explain it on my YouTube channel.

A good, high-quality table tennis blade must have these typical features:

1. High quality and old wood
2. Clear vibration, and good flexibility
3. Strong power on the blade
4. Good weight distribution between the handle and the head

Many things that I want to explain to you the “art of table tennis blade making”. But I need time. I will share and explain to you all of this when I have free time.

All wood blade vs carbon blade

In the modern table tennis, professional prefer faster and harder blade. With the new ball, players get harder to impact the spin to the ball. Harimoto Tomokazu also confirmed that playing with a more flexible racket give him confidence.  So what is the wise choice here?

• All wood blade is thin (thinner than 6.0 mm) and flexible, a must for beginner players. It provides feeling and flexibility. Some amateur players made the wrong choice. They have picked very fast carbon blade. And this ruined their early development stage in their ping-pong career. Even some top player like Xu Xin, prefer sticking with all wood players. To increase the speed, you can choose 5+2 composition blade (5 layers of wood and 2 layers of ALC).
• Carbon blade is hard and stiff. It’s not good for beginners. The hardness eliminates the feeling of the serve, and service return. The stiffness reduces the good vibration to your hand. All of these pieces of information are crucial to new players (to learn the techniques). Use only carbon blade if you are the advanced player, and your playing style is more close-to-table hitters.
• At present, composition blades (5+2) are the most popular not only for the amateur level but also among top professional players.

Difference between hardness and stiffness

They are not the same. New players often confront these 2 terms.

• Hardness is the feeling of the outer-ply of your blade. It depends on the hardness of the outer-ply of your blade. The soft outer layer will give a softer feeling.
• While stiffness depends on the composition, the thickness of the blade. The stiff blade doesn’t have vibrations. Carbon blade is stiff. And stiffness is the opposite of flexibility. The stiff blade is less flexible and inversely, the flexible blade is less stiff.

Top 10 professional table tennis blade

There are many good table tennis blades out there. All of these rackets share the same properties: Sharp feeling, clear vibration, and powerful! In general, there are some very good brands like Butterfly, Stiga, Double Happiness, Nittaku, Darker, OSP, Tibhar, Yasaka, and Donic. This list is not exclusive! You should consider it as the reference of the very good blades for serious table tennis player!

1. Butterfly Viscaria
2. Butterfly Timo Boll Spirit
3. DHS Hurricane Long 5
4. Butterfly Primorac
5. Darker Speed 90
6. Nittaku Acoustic
7. Stiga Clipper
8. Tibhar Stratus Power Wood
9. Stiga Offensive Classic
10. Yasaka Ma Lin Carbon

1. Butterfly Viscaria

• Weight 90g
• Thickness: 5.8mm
• Plies: 7 (5 wood plies; 2 Arylate-carbon)
• Composition: Koto, ALC, Limba, Kiri, Limba, ALC, Koto
• Fit well: with Tenergy rubbers
• Playing style: topspin counter-attack style close to mid. Very strong on backhand attack

Viscaria (read reviews/ check price) is no doubt one of the most famous blades of all time. It’s popularized by the 4th Grand Slam player Zhang Jike. This blade is very all-round. Fast, spinny, and very good for the backhand flick, and backhand topspin attack. I wouldn’t recommend this blade is if you are a beginner still learning the basic strokes. You would be better with a classic 5 plies wood like a Nittaku Acoustic or Violin. This is an all-time classic blade for offensive players!

2. Butterfly Timo Boll Spirit

• Plies: 5W+2ALC
• Thickness: 5.8mm
• Head Size: (Medium size) 157x150mm
• Weight: 87-93g
• Composition:  koto 0.5mm – ALC 0.25mm – limba 0.5mm – Kiri 3.2mm – limba – ALC – koto
• Fit well: ESN, Tenergy rubbers
• Playing style: topspin attack style close to mid. Balanced of backhand, forehand.

Timo Boll Spirit (Read reviews/ Check price/ Order online) is supported by Timo Boll. It’s great for the European looping style of play. The blade has a good balance of speed and control. An overwhelming choice by many Butterfly sponsored players.

If your level is the intermediate level player to a national level, then this blade is for you. One of the best all-round blade in table tennis.

But if you found this blade is slow, then you can try Timo Boll ZLC or Zhang Jike ZLC. Looping on both sides have a lot of control! When combined with ESN rubbers, or Tenergy rubbers, the racket creates heavy spin. This is a blade made for the playing style close to mid-distance.

3. DHS Hurricane Long 5

• Weight 90-92g
• Plies 5+2
• Thickness 5.7-5.9 mm 
• Composition: limba-ayous-arylate-ayous-arylate-ayous-limba 
• Head size: Medium-Large 158 mm x 150 mm
• Fit well with hard Chinese rubber on Forehand, ESN rubber on the backhand
• Playing style: looping style mid to far. Favorite by forehand dominant player.

Hurricane Long 5 (Check price/ Read reviews/ Order online) is a looping machine. It is fast but has excellent control! Good amount of flexibility makes easy to “spin” and “feel” the ball. Combined very well with hard rubber on Forehand (like H3NEO 40 degree, or Gold Arc 8 47-50 hardness). This blade is for looping style because it has a good dwell time and large head size.

The biggest con of this blade is that it is really heavy and when you put 2 hard rubbers it goes around 200 grams. This blade is more for professional players, if you are new to the sport I don’t recommend it.

(Unboxing HL 5 by Tabletennis11)

4. Butterfly Primorac

• Plies: 5 Wood layers
• Thickness: 5.5mm
• Made in: Japan
• Weight: 88g-91g
• Composition: Limba-Limba-Ayous-Limba-Limba
• Fit well with Chinese rubbers

Primorac (Check price/ Read review) is one of the Butterfly’s overall best-selling shakehand blades. This blade provides good feel and control. It is an excellent all-round offensive blade. It’s the best-selling Butterfly blade for a reason – very well balanced – its 90g, very comfortable handle, good control, good speed, the feeling is pleasing. One of the best all-wood blade right now!

5. Nittaku Acoustic

• Weight 85g
• Speed: OFF-
• Plies 5
• Thickness 5.7mm
• Composition: Limba Limba Tung Limba Limba

The Nittaku Acoustic  (check price/ read reviews) is an amazing 5 Ply Offensive blade with Limba outer layers. It has an amazing feel with a very clear vibration. One of the old blade used by Ma Long. Power and speed are very good for an all wood blade. The main strength is the feel and the consistency. Great for developing players and advanced players. Very high build quality by Nittaku.

This blade is #1! If you have one, keep it as a gem. It’s a unique feeling, control is wonderful!

6. Darker Speed 90

• Composition: 1-ply Kiso Hinoki 9mm
• Weight 82g ~ 100g
• Dimensions: ~ 158 x 150mm
• Thickness: 9mm
• Suitable for strong offensive topspin attack
• Speed: OFF to OFF+
• Fit well with ESN and Japanese rubbers

This blade (check price/ read review) is a legend! It’s the best one ply Hinoki blade in the world!

Nothing can replace the feeling that you get from a Darker Speed 90 in your hand. This blade is highly dynamic, offering great touch and the slow speed at low impact and huge power with high spin at high impact. The optimized thickness and shape provide a highly stable blade with the largest sweet spot. If you don’t like vibration, Darker Speed is for you! It gives virtually zero vibrations.

7. Stiga Clipper

• Rating: OFF
• Thickness: 6.6mm
• Weight: 95g
• Construction: 7-ply
• Composition: limba-ayous-ayous-ayous-ayous-ayous-limba
• Fit very well with: Chinese rubber on Forehand, Tenergy rubber on backhand

Stiga Clipper (check price/ read review) is a legend, used by many Chinese players. This blade is very popular in Asia. Used by Liu Guoliang, this blade is for players who want an all wood blade without sacrificing speed and power. Even in the modern plastic ball era, this blade is fast enough to compete with other offensive class carbon blades.

For the new poly ball, you can play with Stiga Clipper CR. Used by Gao Ning and several Chinese provincial team members.

Good alternative: Stiga Carbonado 145, and Stiga Rosewood NCT V.

8. Tibhar Stratus Power Wood

• Weight 85-90g
• Speed: OFF to OFF-
• Plies 5
• Thickness: 6.2 mm
• Composition: Limba-Limba-Ayous-Limba-Limba
• Good dwell = good power, good short game
• Fit very well with ESN medium hardness
• FH: Donic Barracuda, Xiom Vega
• BH: Donic Barracuda, and another good ESN rubbers

Pair Stratus Power (Check price/ read review) with medium hard tensors and it will make miracles for you. This is the most balanced blade. Its main strength is the control and the spin ability. Very good for European, 2 wings looper style. There are few blades as consistent and reliable as this one.

9. Stiga Offensive Classic

• Speed: ALL to ALL+
• Thickness: 5.1mm
• Weight: 85g
• Construction: 5-ply
• Composition: koto-spruce-ayous-spruce-koto
• Fit well with Chinese on forehand (729 Friendship or DHS H2) and Stiga Mantra M on backhand.

The Stiga Allround Classic (check price/ read reviews) is a truly classic blade. The best choice for all levels. Strokes of all kinds can be executed with precision and quality. High-quality spinny loop, high arc attack, and spinny serve! The best all-round ALL blade! Suite well for beginners and intermediate players! Very balanced blade! Very spinny, good vibration!

I think a lot of people complain about the lack of speed but I don’t think that’s really a problem. It’s all about the techniques!

Should consider: Stiga Infinity VPS V, Stiga Allround Classic WRB.

10. Yasaka Ma Lin Extra

• Number of Layers: 5
• weights: 88-90g
• Blade Type: OFF
• thickness: 6mm
• composition: walnut-spruce-ayous-spruce-walnut
• fit very well with 2 Mark V on both sides

Yasaka Ma Lin Extra (check price/ read review) is a fast blade with good speed and a large sweet spot. The center veneer is a little bit thicker and harder, which gives additional power. One of the best 5 plies blade! Not very stiff, well balanced. Suitable for close and play away from the table, for both celluloid 40 and new plastic 40+ ball. Its Stiffness allows for stable passive blocking. Solid quality blade. Great for looping close and mid-distance. The CPEN version is also very good.

References

• Top 10 rubbers for backhand
• Table tennis blades by brands
• Official website of table tennis manufacturers