WTA
WTA Tournaments guide
What is the WTA?
The WTA is the Women’s Tennis Association and is the primary organising body of women’s tennis across the world. Governing the WTA Tour, the professional women’s tennis tour on which all major tournaments are played, the WTA takes command over everything in women’s tennis. The WTA deliver a better future for women in the sport and give them the platform to excel and compete at the highest level.
Winning matches and tournaments on the WTA Tour is how professional players are paid for their work, with prize money for tournament wins going as high as $2.6 million (US Open) for claiming the title.
Many players will win a vast number of tournaments in their careers, taking home bucketloads of prize money by the time they have retired. Iga Swiatek, the world number one, has earned over $9 million in 2022 alone.
WTA 2022 Finals
The WTA Finals are the season-ending championship that conclude every WTA season, pitting the best singles players and doubles teams from across the WTA season against each other.
The 2022 edition of the WTA Finals was held at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth in the United States from October 31 – November 7.
It is an indoor hard-court tournament, and each year invites the eight best WTA players and eight best doubles teams of the year. This year Caroline Garcia of France won the singles tournament and Veronika Kudermetova / Elise Mertens won the doubles.
WTA Finals 2022 Draw:
Singles:
- Iga Swiatek
- Ons Jabeur
- Jessica Pegula
- Coco Gauff
- Maria Sakkari
- Caroline Garcia (Winner)
- Aryna Sabalenka
- Daria Kasatkina
Doubles:
- Barbora Krejcikova & Katerina Siniakova (CZE)
- Gabriela Dabrowski & Giuliana Olmos (CAN / MEX)
- Coco Gauff & Jessica Pegula (USA)
- Veronika Kudermetova & Elise Mertens (RUS / BEL) (Winner)
- Lyudmyla Kichenok & Jelena Ostapenko (UKR / LAT)
- Xu Yifan & Yang Zhaoxuan (CHI)
- Anna Danilina & Beatriz Haddad Maia (KHA / BRA)
- Desirae Krawczyk & Demi Schuurs (USA / NED)
How to qualify for WTA tournaments?
Qualifying for WTA tournaments is a job that isn’t achieved in one instance, it is instead an accumulation of results over months and sometimes years which give a player/ doubles teams their WTA rankings.
Players and teams will then qualify or fail to qualify for tournaments based on their ranking position at a given time. When a player fails to reach the required ranking for a tournament, they may instead make it into positions that offer qualification rounds, where they will then have to win a few matches to enter the tournament as a qualifier.
WTA Points table
Players receive progressively more ranking points for each tournament round they progress through, making success in a championship as important for making it to the next one as for the paycheck at the end!
This is how the rounds delegate points at Grand Slam tournaments like Wimbledon and the US Open, as well as other WTA events.
| Grand Slam | WTA 1000 Mandatory | WTA 1000 Mandatory | WTA 1000 Mandatory | WTA 1000 Non-Mandatory | WTA 500 | WTA 500 | WTA 250 | WTA 250 | WTA 125 | WTA 125 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| [128 Players Draw] | [96 Players Draw] | [64 Players Draw] | [32 Players Draw] | [56 Players Draw] | [64/56/48 Players Draw] | [32/30/28 Players Draw] | [56 Players Draw] | [32 Players Draw] | [48 Players Draw] | [32 Players Draw] | ||
| Winner | 2 000 | 1 000 | 1 000 | 1 000 | 900 | 470 | 470 | 280 | 280 | 160 | 160 | |
| Finalist | 1 300 | 650 | 650 | 650 | 585 | 305 | 305 | 180 | 180 | 95 | 95 | |
| Semi-Finalist | 780 | 390 | 390 | 390 | 350 | 185 | 185 | 110 | 110 | 57 | 57 | |
| Quarter-Finalist | 430 | 215 | 215 | 215 | 190 | 100 | 100 | 60 | 60 | 29 | 29 | |
| Round of 16 | 240 | 120 | 120 | 120 | 105 | 55 | 55 | 30 | 30 | 15 | 15 | |
| Round of 32 | 130 | 65 | 65 | 10 | 60 | 30 | 1 | 16 | 1 | 8 | 1 | |
| Round of 64 | 70 | 35 | 10 | - | 1 | 1 | - | 1 | - | 1 | - | |
| Round of 128 | 10 | 10 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
WTA Categories
There are different categories of WTA tournaments, each providing a different number of points, prize money and prestige to the winners.
Much like the leagues in the football system, the top players will only play at the highest level of the WTA Tour and will not compete at the bottom end of the spectrum.
Grand Slams (Wimbledon / US Open are the highest level, with WTA 1000 offering the second highest amount of prize money on the tour).
Categories:
- Grand Slam
- WTA 1000
- WTA 500
- WTA 250
- WTA 125
Grand Slam
Grand Slam tournaments offer the highest amount of prize money, and the trophies are the most sought-after across the whole of tennis. The Grand Slams are the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open.
WTA 1000
WTA 1000 tournaments offer winners of the tournament 1000 points and are among the most prestigious in the year’s tennis calendar.
The events are split into mandatory and non-mandatory events. The mandatory WTA 1000 tournaments are Indian Wells, Miami, Madrid and Beijing.
WTA 500
WTA 500 tournaments offer a lower 470 points for winners and a lower prize pool of around $500,000.
WTA 250
Winning a WTA 250 event awards lesser points still at 280 and is a tournament that offers a prize pool of approximately $250,000.
Longest WTA Tennis match
The longest WTA tennis match was played between Vicki Nelson and Jean Hepner in 1984 and took six hours and 31 minutes to complete.
It is said that the match featured a 29-minute long, 643-shot rally though no video evidence of the point exists.
Shortest WTA Tennis match
The fastest-ever WTA match was played between Margaret Court and Darlene Hard at the Eastern Grass Court Championships and took just 24 minutes, with the score ending 6-1, 6-1 in favour of Court.
