The 2025 WTA season ended as it began – with Aryna Sabalenka at No. 1.
Sabalenka clinched the year-end No. 1 ranking for the second year in a row before the start of the season-ending WTA Finals this past week in Riyadh. She finished as runner-upat the year-end championship, though she didn't need to win a single point.
Sabalenka joined some elite company. She’s just the 13th player to finish No. 1 in back-to-back years since the computer rankings system started in 1975.
Sabalenka has been No. 1 for 64 total weeks - tied for the 12th-best total of all time. She ends the 2025 season with 56 consecutive weeks at the top spot and counting.
Who moved up the WTA rankings during the last two months of the season?
If Sabalenka can finish No. 1 for a third consecutive season in 2026, she’ll join truly rarified air. Only five players have finished as year-end No. 1 three times in a row – Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf, Serena Williams, and Ashleigh Barty.
Elena Rybakina won the Ningbo Open in mid-October and performed well enough in three other post-U.S. Open events to move up from No. 10 to No. 6 in time to qualify for the WTA Finals. She then won the event, claimed more than $5 million in prize money, and rose to No. 5 in the year-end rankings.
Belinda Benic parlayed a win at the Tokyo Open in late October into a six-spot rise to No. 11. Linda Noskova, Benic’s opponent in the Tokyo final, also made the final at the WTA 1000 event in Beijing, resulting in a 16-spot post-U.S. Open jump to No. 13.
Who moved down?
Mirra Andreeva was No. 5 in the world heading into the U.S. Open and seemed a near-lock to qualify for the WTA Finals. However, the 18-year-old failed to win more than two matches at any event after Wimbledon and slipped to No. 9 by late October, missing the year-end event by one spot.
Qinwen Zheng was holding on to a top 10 spot entering the fall, but re-injured her surgically repaired right elbow during the China Open in her home country. She had to miss two additional events where she performed well in 2024. The resulting loss of ranking points dropped her to No. 24.
Who’s about to rise?
Noskova, just 20, isn’t defending many ranking points in January and could jump into the top 10 with a strong tournament or two.
Iva Jovic, an American teen already ranked No. 35, could approach the top 20 if she plays the full month of events in Australia and wins a few matches.
Who could fall?
Year-end No. 7 and reigning Australian Open champion Madison Keys played sparingly after the U.S. Open and must defend more than half of her ranking points when the 2026 season starts Down Under. Keys could fall out of the top 20 with early exits in Australia.
19 years ago this happened
Justin Henin clinched the No. 1 spot for the 2006 season by reaching the final of the WTA Finals, where she knocked off Amelie Mauresmo. Henin finished as the year-end No. 1 for the second time.