Like every other sport, tennis has big events that define the course of the year. There are both male and female tennis players, with the ATP the male league and the WTA the female league. Players in each league compete in tournaments hoping to earn points and cash prizes.
Participants in tournaments get a certain amount of points and cash payouts depending on where they finish in the tournament, with the winner receiving the most and the scale descending downward. Those points define their place in the ATP or WTA standings, which define their global rankings.
While the ATP and WTA are the heart of modern tennis, they are not the only part of the sport to be aware of. Tennis is a massive, global sport, and there are an array of international tournaments and events that define it.
Since tennis is such a huge sport, it can be hard to keep track of all the options bettors have. That is where we come in. We are here to help, providing breakdowns of the biggest events in tennis for betting and exploring everything you need to know about the major tennis organizations, dates, and tournaments that define the sport.
Betting on Grand Slam tournaments:
With tennis, the biggest defining events in the sports calendar are the Grand Slam tournaments. These are the four major tennis players that take place throughout the year. They are the tournaments that give players the most points and cash prizes and have the most prestige and global recognition.
These tournaments feature ATP and WTA brackets for both singles and doubles and are the prime events for betting on tennis. Let’s take a quick look at each of these events.
- Australian Open: The Australian Open is the first of the Grand Slam events that are held every year, typically in the middle of January. It lasts for two weeks and is played on a hard court surface. The event is typically held in Melbourne, Australia, at Melbourne Park. It is the most heavily attended tennis tournament of the year and huge for bettors. It features 128 players for the singles tournament or 64 teams for doubles. It first began in 1905.
- French Open: The French Open, which is also known as Roland-Garros, is a massive tournament that is played at Stade Roland Garros in Paris, where it has been played since 1928. The tournament was first founded in 1891. It is typically held in May every year and is played on clay courts with best-of-five-set men's singles matches, which give it a reputation as a physically draining event. This tournament has been dominated by Rafael Nadal, who is considered the best clay player of all time. Tennis betting French Open is incredibly popular.
- Wimbledon: The Wimbledon is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, dating back to 1877, and is seen as the most prestigious of any of the Grand Slam events. It is played on a grass surface at the All Englands Club in Wimbledon, London. This is an event oft-attended by royals and the upper crusts of English society, and it has a unique feel for a sporting event. It is played in late June and early July and has 128 competitors in the singles tournament and 64 teams in the doubles. Tennis betting Wimbledon is a tradition more than a century old.
- US Open: The US Open is America's biggest tournament and the final Major on the professional tennis calendar. It is typically played in August and first began in 1881. It is played at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City and has a prize fund of $60 million USD. Tennis betting US Open matches is something bettors love and is extremely commonplace. The US Open is played on a hard-court surface and has the standard 128 singles and 64 doubles for their tournament.
Betting on ATP and WTA Tour events
As we've mentioned briefly, the ATP and WTA Tour are the highest tiers of professional tennis for men and women, respectively. These are the two leagues composed of the best male and female tennis players in the world who travel the world, competing head-to-head in tournaments.
There are several categories of tournaments that tennis players compete in on the ATP and WTA tours. As we've mentioned, the highest category is the Grand Slam or Major tournaments, which we've touched on above. But the tour consists of many other tournaments, where winners and people that place high earn specific numbers of points.
The tour is divided into different categories, where each event is worth differing amounts of points and differing cash prizes. Bettors can wager on the different tour events throughout the year. Most sportsbooks cover every significant event in both the ATP and WTA tours.
Below, we’ll look at the breakdown of the events and categories in the tour that bettors should be aware of.
ATP 1000:
The ATP 1000 is a category of event on the ATP Tour that provides 1,000 ranking points to the victor. There are nine ATP 1000 events that are played across the year, spanning the globe. These are massive tennis events that are played by the best in the world, although they aren't quite as significant as the Grand Slams.
Bettors are able to wager on the ATP 1000 events, and they are significant occasions that are attended by thousands of fans spanning the globe. Each tournament in the ATP 1000 has cash prizes that pay out on average north of $5,000,000, so the stakes are still mighty high. Most ATP 1000 tournaments have a mandatory player commitment, so the best players must be present.
Below are some of the different ATP 1000 events to know.
- Indian Wells Masters: Played every year on a hard-court surface in Indian Wells, California. The tournament is typically held in early-mid March.
- Miami Open: Played annually between March and April in Miami Gardens, Florida, on a hard-court surface.
- Monte-Carlo Masters: Played annually on a clay court near Monaco in Southeastern France. It is typically held between April and May.
- Madrid Open: Held annually in Madrid, Spain, on a Clay court. The tournament is typically played in early May.
- Italian Open: Held every year in Rome and is played on a clay court. The tournament takes place in May.
- Canadian Open: This tournament takes place in either Toronto or Montreal, depending on the year. It is played on a hard-court and takes place during August.
- Cincinnati Masters: This tournament is played yearly in Cincinnati on a hard-court in August.
- Shanghai Masters: This tournament takes place on a hard-court annually in Shanghai, China. It will be played in early October.
- Paris Masters: This tournament is played in Paris on an indoor hard-court every year from late October to early November.
ATP 500
The ATP 500 is the next tier of ATP tournaments, consisting of 13 different tournaments that are played throughout the year. These tournaments reward winners with 500 standing points if they are victorious. They do not have the prestige of ATP 1000 or Grand Slam tournaments but are still important components of gaining standing points in ATP events and have average cash prizes that are distributed among winners of $1,800,000.
They are smaller tournaments that have draws of 32 and 48 for singles. While they may not be the biggest tournaments, they are still often attended by the biggest names in professional tennis, with Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal both having recently held the record for most ATP 500 victories.
The ATP 500 events take place at locations around the globe. The Rio Open is played in Brazil, the Rotterdam Open in the Netherlands, the Astana Open in Kazakhstan, and the Japan Open in Japan. These tournaments are exciting and fun to wager on. Every sportsbook that has tennis coverage should have betting options available for ATP 500 events.
ATP Finals
The ATP Finals is the final event of the ATP Tour. Aside from the four majors, it is the most important event of the ATP calendar and is often called the fifth Grand Slam. The ATP Finals is worth between 1,100-1,500 ranking points and has an average prize fund of $7,250,000.
The ATP Finals is typically played in November, and since 2021, it has been played in Turin, Italy. The tournament has a unique format to other tournaments, with only eight players qualifying according to their standing. Those eight players are placed into two groups of four, where they play in a round-robin game against each other. The top two players from each group make it to the semi-final.
As the final event on the ATP calendar, this tournament is hugely significant. It is crucial for tennis betting and can often decide who has the most points at the end of an ATP calendar. It is considered the fifth-most important tennis event of the year.
WTA
The WTA Tour is much like the ATP Tour. It features female competitors but has much of the same format as the ATP format. There are the same Grand Slam tournaments, the WTA Finals, the WTA 1000, the WTA 500, and the WTA 250.
The competitors face off in the same tournaments for the WTA 1000, like the Indian Wells and Shanghai Masters. For the WTA 500, the tournaments are different. There are matches played across Australia, a tournament in the Czech Republic, and a tournament in Moscow.
The WTA is the peak of female tennis and follows the same format as the ATP Tour, with only slight variations. Both are exciting tours of tennis that feature world-class athletes, with big names from the WTA tour, including some of the greatest tennis players of all time in Serena Williams, Steffi Graff, Chris Evert, and more.
All viable tennis betting sites will have markets and odds available for WTA events.
Olympic Games:
The ATP and WTA don’t monopolize tennis. There are also international events like the Olympics. Every four years, the summer Olympics are held, which feature tennis tournaments.
Olympic tennis tournaments feature many of the top tennis players in the world representing their country, competing to try and claim bronze, silver, and gold medals for the top three finishers. The tournament consists of 64 athletes in a single-elimination tournament for singles and 32 athletes in single-elimination for doubles. Both men and women have their own Olympic tennis tournaments.
You can bet on tennis during the Olympics on any sports betting site that has tennis coverage.
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