What Are The Best Tennis Strings Of 2023?

Searching for the optimal tennis string? It's not hard to come by three popular brands: Luxilon Alu Power, Babolat RPM Blast and Solinco Hyper-G. You'll find a plethora of reviews online touting positive feedback from avid players - but what sets these strings apart? Is it performance, science or innovation? The answer is simple: savvy marketing tactics!

Ultimately, most players should be using synthetic or multifilament instead of full poly strings for their rackets.

The Appeal Of Luxilon Alu Power

In the 1990s, Luxilon revolutionised tennis with its polyester strings. Compared to other string materials such as natural gut, synthetic (nylon) gut and kevlar or aramid that were used by professional players during that period, Poly offered a huge advantage: spin! With poly strings, players could adopt a more attacking game with topspin.

The dominant serve and volley players, such as Pete Sampras, were no longer able to overpower their opponents with a quick rush to the net. With court speeds decreasing and Luxilon strings providing more spin on shots, players had both the time and capability to hit incredible passing shots - even against those elite serve-and-volleyers! By around the 2000s, it was usual for most professional tennis players either to have polyester strings in full bed or a hybrid with natural/synthetic gut.

Luxilon Alu Power has been the go-to choice amongst professionals for its top quality and power, thanks to the aluminium blended into it. These additional materials do make a difference in how strings feel when played with. Strings such as Solinco Tour Bite or Grapplesnake Tour Sniper feature the same silver hue and include aluminium just as Alu Power does, providing much crispness to their shots.

The Appeal Of Babolat RPM Blast

When Rafael Nadal took on Roger Federer in 2004, it quickly became apparent that Nadal was someone special. He not only defeated the number one ranked player at the time, but he did so using an incredibly physical and heavy topspin style unlike any we'd seen before. At this point in his career, he was using Babolat's Duralast string - a first-generation polyester product that wasn't selling very well at all.

When Nadal became the world's number one in 2008, Babolat saw it as an ideal time to create a string specifically tailored to his spin-heavy playing style. In 2010, they released their revolutionary product: Babolat RPM Blast. Unlike Luxilon Alu Power, this black polyester string had two unique features; firstly was its 8-sided octagon shape which resulted in a greater bite between the ball and string thereby leading to increased spin when compared with standard round strings like Alu Power.

The second breakthrough was a silicone coating on the surface of the string. This reduced frictions between the mains and crosses, which run vertically and horizontally respectively along the racket face - thus allowing for more snapback after contact with the ball.

How Polyester Strings Generate Spin

The secret to powerful and consistent spin for polyester tennis strings is the snapback. Polyesters are much slicker than other materials, such as synthetic or aramid. Due to polyesters' stiffness and smoothness, the strings snap back into position after making contact with the ball.

The extra spin is generated by the main string that snaps back into place, providing a powerful grip on the ball. That's why RPM Blast has 8 grippy edges - to help maximize rotational force and ensure maximum energy transfer. Additionally, the silicone coating reduces friction so that the strings snap back even faster!

The Downside Of RPM Blast And Alu Power

Even today, RPM Blast is a popular choice amongst the world's top players such as Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz. Luxilon Alu Power also enjoys great fame with Grand Slam champions like Djokovic, Federer and Murray using it in some form. The only snag with both these poly strings is their short life span.

Not too long ago, polyester strings weren't able to maintain tension for longer than a few hours. Professional players rarely ever break their strings now when you watch them play; however, they are still replacing their rackets every nine games because of how quickly the polys lose tension. The reason behind this is that compared to nylon or natural gut, it's not an elastic material and is unable to revert to its initial length after being stretched out. But in 2015 we saw a positive shift with the Hyper-G.

The Appeal Of Hyper-G

An innovative company known as Solinco created a stir eight years ago with the release of their brightly-hued Hyper-G string. Rather than opting for an orthodox top-down marketing method like Luxilon and Babolat, they decided to sponsor some of America's best collegiate teams - which in turn made this bright green string ubiquitous among the country's young talented players.

Hyper-G raised the bar in comparison to other strings by providing exceptional tension maintenance of 4-5 hours, as opposed to just 1-2 hours of polys such as the RPM Blast and Alu Power.

What Strings Are Best For You?

With so many string options, it can be hard to decide what's best for you. But don't worry; while Hyper-G has been around for 8 years and may have seemed like a great pick at the time, there are more than enough strings available now that will provide an even better experience - all without breaking your budget! Alu Power and RPM Blast might offer a good feel or spin respectively but won’t last beyond two hours in your racket before losing their tension quickly. Polyester strings, while having their appeal to certain players, are not suitable for everyone. It is worth noting that they require a significant amount of force to achieve any sort of snapback effect when playing.

As such, I recommend synthetic or multifilament strings as the preferred choice for beginner and intermediate players due to the additional comfort offered along with increased feel, power and forgiveness on each shot. The specific brands I use are Whipper Spin Perfect (synthetic) and ProKennex IQ Elite (multifilament).

If you're uncertain of how to begin your selection of strings, I provide personalised string consultations. Here, we'll work through some in-depth questions regarding your playing style and preferences so that I can craft a customised string menu just for you! That way, it's tailored specifically to the type of tennis that best suits your skill set.