How often should I re-string my tennis racket?

When to restring actually depends more on your skill level than how often you hit the courts.

The old rule of thumb has always been to re-string your tennis racket as many times a year as you play in one week. Here's a more in-depth explanation: 

Beginner (plays once a month) 

We define a beginner as someone who is brand new to the game and is taking lessons once a month, and maybe even hitting a few times in between.  To this player, we’d recommend re-stringing every three months. While you won’t break your strings, the tension of your strings (how tight or loose they are) will change dramatically in that time. Your strings begin losing tension the moment your racket is taken off the stringing machine.  Re-stringing every three months will keep your string tension as consistent as possible, resulting in a much better learning experience.  You wouldn’t learn to golf with different size clubs every week would you?

• Cost: At this level, we’d recommend a  (Wilson Synthetic Gut Power) to  (Wilson NXT) multifilament. Assuming a stringing fee, you’re looking at anywhere from a year.

Intermediate (plays 3-4 times a month)

Think of an intermediate player as someone who’s been playing for a few years now and is starting to take their tennis more seriously. Assuming you’re willing to spend some money on your equipment, we’d recommend this player re-string their racket once a month. Whether you’re playing in leagues or starting to enter a tournament or two, it’s important to maintain your strings’ tension for consistent performance as you start to compete. 

• Cost: At this level, we’d recommend a multifilament (Wilson NXT) or hybrid (Wilson DUO Feel). Assuming a  stringing fee, you’re looking at a year.

Advanced (plays 4-7 days a week)

We consider advanced players either those training full-time for match play (junior tournaments, college tennis, etc.) or those who trained this frequently at one time in their life. The best rule of thumb we have for those training 4-7 days a week is “re-string when you break”. Most advanced players playing this frequently will break a string every week or two, so no need to re-string until you break unless you have an important tournament coming up, in which case you should have fresh strings in all your rackets.  For advanced players who no longer play this frequently, we’d recommend restringing your racket as often as possible. Whether you’re playing once a week or once a month, you know consistent equipment will give you the best playing experience any time you’re able to hit a few balls.  

• Cost: For this level, we’d recommend buying reels of string rather than individual sets for significant savings. For example, a reel of Luxilon ALU Power comes with 18 sets of string for  while buying 18 individual sets of that same string will cost.
• For juniors, we’d recommend reels of Wilson NXT Power  and Luxilon Element  to hybrid while, for current or former college players, we’d recommend reels of Wilson NXT Control  as a comfortable multifilament option, Luxilon ALU Power  as a control-oriented polyester option, or Luxilon 4G if you need something very durable.