Force Plate
Equipment
A force plate is a precision measurement device that captures ground reaction forces produced during athletic movements — jumps, landings, squats, isometric holds, and more. It translates those force measurements into performance metrics like peak force, rate of force development, impulse, and jump height. Force plates are the gold standard for objective lower body power assessment in sports science.
What Coaches Should Know
Force plates have come down in price significantly — platforms from VALD, ForceDecks, and Hawkin Dynamics are now accessible for many collegiate programs. The data they provide is genuinely useful for tracking athlete development, identifying asymmetries, monitoring readiness, and making return-to-play decisions. If your program is serious about data-driven training, a force plate is one of the highest-value technology investments you can make.
That said, the value comes from consistent testing protocols and knowing what to do with the data — not from the hardware itself. Before investing, make sure you have a plan for how you’ll test athletes, how often, what metrics you’ll track, and how those metrics will inform programming decisions. A force plate collecting dust because no one built a testing system around it is an expensive mistake.
Also related to: VBT, AMS, Load Management, Readiness Score