Switch Mats as a Force Plate Alternative

By Richard Burnett, MS, SCCC, CSCS, CAFS

In the world of athlete assessment, one question that continues to surface is whether switch mats can serve as a viable alternative to force plates. Having spent the last several months running comprehensive testing at Triple F Elite Sports Training, including both force plate assessments and switch mat testing (Plyomat), I’ve had the opportunity to compare both systems in-depth, especially when it comes to countermovement jump (CMJ) testing and its value in tracking lower body power.

Let’s explore what the data shows, and more importantly, what it means for coaches and practitioners looking for accurate, efficient, and affordable athlete evaluation tools.

Why Lower Body Power Still Reigns Supreme

Lower body power is one of the most foundational traits for athleticism. Whether you’re tracking improvements over time, screening athletes for asymmetries, or comparing performance across populations, lower body power remains a critical key performance indicator (KPI).

As defined in Daniel Bove’s Takeoff, lower body power is the athlete’s ability to generate vertical force rapidly and efficiently, a key requirement in nearly every sport. CMJ testing, when analyzed properly, provides clear insight into this ability.

In my testing across hundreds of athletes from multiple sports and grade levels, CMJ-based metrics (like jump height, relative propulsive net impulse, and mRSI) showed the strongest correlations to key outcomes like sprint speed and change of direction ability. That trend remained consistent across force plate and switch mat assessments.

Force Plates: The Gold Standard… But Not Without Limitations

There’s no denying that force plates offer a deep, granular look at an athlete’s jump strategy and neuromuscular qualities. Metrics like:

• Modified Reactive Strength Index (mRSI)
• Braking Rate of Force Development (RFD)
• Eccentric:Concentric ratios
• Propulsive net impulse and peak power

…provide rich context for evaluating not just what happened (i.e., jump height), but how it happened.

The data output and reporting capabilities from force plate companies' robust software allow coaches to see detailed insights in eccentric load tolerance, reactive strategies, and asymmetries.

BUT: in a practical, field-based setting—especially for high schools, small colleges, or private facilities—force plates still fall short in a few areas:

• They are expensive; often $5,000+ per system and yearly subscription of $2,000+
• They require ongoing training and interpretation to establish meaning and context
• They have higher setup needs, bulkier footprint, and slower throughput during team testing

Most importantly, while the data is rich, not all metrics are actionable or necessary for the average coach looking to track progress in youth or team athletes. In many cases, all we really need to know is:

“Is this athlete producing more force and jumping higher than they were last month?”

Switch Mats Holding Their Own

For years, the conversation around switch mats (also called contact mats or jump mats) has often been accompanied by skepticism—especially when compared to the “gold standard” of force plates. But recent research is shifting that narrative.

In a 2022 validity and reliability study presented at the New England ACSM Conference, researchers compared jump height data from the Plyomat switch mat against an Accupower force plate across 48 Division III football players performing bilateral countermovement jumps. Importantly, the study standardized the comparison by calculating jump height for both systems using time-in-air rather than takeoff velocity—a move that ensures a fair assessment based on the mat’s intended calculation method.

The findings:

·       A very strong positive correlation was found between the Plyomat and force plate jump heights:

r = 0.95 (95% CI: 0.91–0.97), p < 0.001 .

·       While Plyomat measurements were slightly higher (mean difference of 1.01 cm), the effect size was negligible (d = 0.16).

·       The Plyomat also showed a high degree of test-retest reliability for the highest jumps (ICC = 0.85, SEM = 2.36 cm), which speaks to its repeatability for tracking changes over time.

These results reinforce what many in the field have long suspected: modern switch mats, when used properly, can be a practical, cost-effective proxy for force plates—especially for measuring vertical jump height and lower body power.

At Triple F Elite Sports Training, we’ve mirrored these findings in our own environment. Using our in-house force plates alongside the Plyomat system, we’ve repeatedly seen a near-linear relationship between the two when flight time is used as the basis for jump height. While the force plate offers additional layers of kinetic data, the Plyomat continues to provide consistent, actionable insight into lower body power output—especially valuable in environments where simplicity, portability, and budget are top priorities.

Key finding: When your primary goal is assessing lower body power, the switch mat gets you to the same conclusion.

Force Plate vs. Plyomat: Where Each Excels

Feature	Force Plate	Plyomat (Switch Mat)
Jump Height Accuracy	✅ High (via GRF & CoM)	✅ High (via flight time)
mRSI, Braking RFD, ECC Metrics	✅ Available	❌ Not directly available
Speed of Use / Group Testing	❌ Slower	✅ Very fast
Portability	❌ Heavy & fixed	✅ Lightweight and portable
Cost	❌ $5,000–$15,000	✅ <$1,000 total
RSI / GCT Feedback	✅ Yes	✅ Yes (real-time app feedback)
Reporting Depth	✅ Deep (via software)	✅ Basic, clean app reporting
Custom Protocol Creation	✅ Yes	✅ Yes (within assessments tab)
Best Use Case	Research, elite profiling	Team testing, power tracking, field work

 

What Switch Mats Can’t Do…Yet

To be clear: switch mats can’t directly measure braking forces, eccentric durations, or propulsive impulse the way a force plate can.

But we’ve found creative workarounds.

Using RSI variants, timing of eccentric phase with continuous jumps, and standardized drop jumps from heights with weight being calculated, you can infer eccentric/reactive capabilities. It’s not a 1:1 replacement, but it’s close enough for most field-based coaches to make informed decisions without needing an advanced biomechanics lab.

I believe Force Plates Primarily Belong in Labs and Not the Field.

This might be a controversial statement in 2025 but having used force plates 15 years ago in graduate school and still using them today with my NFL combine athletes, it’s my general conclusion. While force plates offer valuable insight into neuromuscular function and ground reaction forces, I believe their optimal setting is still inside the lab or other highly controller environment, not out in the field. Despite their increasing portability and software improvements, there are three key reasons in my opinion why they are overkill in most sports performance settings like schools and training facilities:

1. Susceptibility to Environmental Noise

Force plates are highly sensitive devices, and that’s both a strength and a weakness. In the field, they’re often exposed to uneven flooring, athlete movement outside the capture area, inconsistent footwear, or poor force plate stabilization, all of which can introduce noise and significantly skew data. Even slight inconsistencies in athlete posture or depth of the countermovement can throw off force-time curve interpretations. This creates a barrier to clean, repeatable testing, especially in group environments.

2. Cumbersome to Derive Meaning

Force plates collect hundreds, if not thousands, of data points in a single jump. But having more data isn’t always better. For most coaches and practitioners, the challenge lies not in collecting the data, but in knowing what to do with it. Braking RFD, net impulses, and propulsive durations might be powerful in theory—but in practice, it often takes a biomechanist or sport scientist to interpret them properly. Without that expertise, you’re left with beautiful graphs and complex exports, but not much that you can apply to training. In contrast, flight time-based metrics like RSI or jump height are intuitive, coach-friendly, and directly tied to performance goals.

3. We Already Measure Strength in the Weight Room

Many of the force plate’s most attractive metrics—RFD, peak force, concentric impulse—are essentially proxies for strength. But we already have established methods of measuring strength where it actually matters: in the weight room. Whether through 1RMs, isometric mid-thigh pulls, load-velocity profiles, or just consistent tracking of bar speed and volume over time, these tools give us the same insights in a more specific, trainable context. Strength is important, but it doesn’t always need to be measured under the foot on a metal plate to tell us something useful.

More Than Just CMJ

While this article focuses solely on CMJ, the Plyomat’s low profile allows for creative reactive jump testing setups (bleacher jumps, lateral bounds, SL to DL transitions) that are harder to execute safely on force plates. This gives coaches better access to athlete expression of power in sport-relevant patterns.

And as switch mat capabilities evolve, I believe we’ll soon see more layered insights—like estimated concentric durations, fatigue indicators, and better integration with sprint splits.

Final Word: Fit the Tool to the Job

Force plates are excellent tools but they aren’t for everyone. For the coach whose primary focus is monitoring change in lower body power over time, evaluating readiness, or running team-wide testing, a switch mat like Plyomat offers a practical, affordable, and effective solution.

As we’ve seen through our own data at Triple F, the story is still the same: athletes who jump higher, faster, and cleaner (regardless of platform) are usually the best athletes on the field.

Let’s not get lost in the tech and forget the purpose.