Tennis solved its gender pay gap problem. Or did it?
The four Grand Slams all pay men and women equally. Wimbledon was the last holdout, finally matching prize money in 2007 after years of pressure. The tennis establishment celebrated. Equal pay achieved. Problem solved. Case closed. Except the numbers tell a different story. One that most fans never see and the sport would prefer you never notice.
In recent seasons, the total prize money distributed across the ATP Tour dwarfs what the WTA pays out by roughly 45 percent. Not at the Grand Slams; those are equal. But everywhere else, the financial gap between men’s and women’s professional tennis remains enormous, structural, and growing.
The Grand Slam Illusion
Yes, Carlos Alcaraz and Iga Świątek both earned $3.6 million for winning the US Open. That made headlines. What didn’t make headlines is that Świątek played one fewer set per match to earn it.
Men play best-of-five sets at Grand Slams, while Women play best-of-three. The math is simple: male champions play roughly 40 percent more tennis for the same prize money. Female champions earn more per set, per game, per hour on court. This isn’t an argument for reducing women’s prize money; it’s a reminder that equality at the Slams masks inequality everywhere else.
This creates the strangest dynamic in professional sports: the only place where the gender pay gap favours women is also the only place anyone’s paying attention.
Where the Real Money Is
Grand Slams represent just four tournaments per year. The rest of professional tennis: the ATP and WTA Tours is where players actually make their living.
Recently, the ATP distributed approximately $215 million in prize money across its tour events. The WTA distributed around $150 million. The gap: $65 million, or roughly 43 percent.
ATP Masters 1000 events pay winners $1.1 million. WTA 1000 events pay winners $1.1 million as well, but only when they’re combined with ATP events. Standalone WTA 1000s pay $850,000 to $900,000.
ATP 500 events pay $500,000 to winners. WTA 500s pay $120,000 to $155,000.
The tier below that gets worse. ATP 250 events offer $250,000 to champions. WTA 250s pay $115,000.
For a top-50 player grinding through the year, this adds up fast. An ATP player winning two 500-level events earns $1 million. A WTA player winning the same number of equivalent tournaments earns $250,000.
Why the Gap Exists
The official explanation is simple: revenue.
ATP tournaments generate more ticket sales, higher broadcast rights fees, and larger sponsorship deals than WTA events. Prize money reflects what the market supports. This is factually true. ATP events do generate more revenue on average. But it’s also incomplete.
The WTA operates in a structural disadvantage that the ATP doesn’t face. Most of the tennis calendar features combined events where ATP and WTA players compete at the same venue during the same week. These events are marketed and broadcast as single products. When combined events negotiate broadcast deals or sponsorships, the money is pooled and then divided. ATP events consistently receive the larger share. The justification: men’s matches draw higher viewership.
But viewership data is complicated. Men’s matches often air in better time slots and receive more promotional support. When WTA matches air in prime slots, viewership is frequently comparable.
The system isn’t designed neutrally and also responds to market forces. The system was built around men’s tennis, and women’s tennis was added later, into a structure that already favoured male players financially.
The Sponsorship Reality
Here’s where it gets more interesting: while prize money favours men, sponsorship income increasingly favours women.
Iga Świątek earns approximately $20 million per year in endorsements, and Coco Gauff makes $15 million to $18 million. Naomi Osaka, even while struggling with form and injuries, still commands $50 million annually in sponsorships.
On the men’s side, only the very top-tier Alcaraz, Sinner, and Djokovic earn comparable endorsement money. The men ranked between 10 and 30 earn far less from sponsors than equivalently ranked women.
Brands have figured out something the tour operators haven’t: women’s tennis offers unique marketing value. The athletes are more accessible, more brand-literate, more willing to create content, and reach demographics that men’s sports struggle to engage.
Top female players monetize social media, lifestyle brands, and fashion partnerships in ways that most male players cannot or will not. Świątek has 1.8 million Instagram followers. Taylor Fritz, ranked similarly on the men’s side, has 380,000.
What Equal Really Means
Tennis presents itself as the progressive sport that solved gender equity. Compared to soccer, basketball, or golf, that’s arguably true. But framing the conversation around Grand Slam prize money obscures the larger financial reality.
For every week of the year that isn’t a Grand Slam, male tennis players operate in a better-funded, more financially secure system than their female counterparts.
The gap isn’t fair. It’s also not easy to fix. WTA events genuinely do generate less revenue in most markets. Mandating equal prize money when revenue isn’t equal would likely mean fewer tournaments, not richer female players.
But pretending the gap doesn’t exist or doesn’t matter because Wimbledon pays equally is dishonest. Tennis hasn’t solved its gender pay problem. It just moved the problem to where fewer people are looking.
The women who win Grand Slams are paid fairly. Everyone else is fighting for scraps because equality in tennis exists for about two weeks a year – and only on Centre Court, when the sport is watching.
