Coco Gauff will travel a smooth road in Paris. Gauff got the best draw in the women's bracket for the 2025 French Open, based on the average world ranking of likely opponents. The 128-player Grand Slam event gets underway on May 25.
Gauff, who recently returned to No. 2 in the world rankings, is the big name in the bottom half of the draw. She wouldn't face any other top contenders for the title - No. 1 seed Aryna Sabalenka, four-time champion Iga Swiatek, or 2024 runner-up Jasmine Paolini - until the final.
Gauff, who reached the French final in 2022, also has a relatively easy draw for the opening rounds. She starts the event against No. 93 Olivia Gadecki. Should she reach the second round, she is guaranteed to face an opponent with an even worse ranking - either No. 121 Chloe Paquet or qualifier Tereza Valentova.
Who got the easiest and toughest draws for the French Open?
The other top seed in Gauff's eighth of the draw is No. 15 Barbora Krejcikova, who has been injured for most of 2025.
Toughest draw for a top seed
No. 5 seed Iga Swiatek's spring string of bad news continues. Based on the average world ranking of likely opponents, Swiatek got the worst draw of any of the tournament's single-digit seeds. Swiatek's recent slide landed her in the same half of the draw as Sabalenka and Paolini. She likely won't face any opponents outside of the top 50.
Swiatek's first match is against world No. 41 Rebecca Sramkova. In Round 2, she'd face No. 42 Xinyu Wang or 43rd-ranked former U.S. Open champion Emma Raducanu.
Toughest draw overall
Four-time major champion and current world No. 49 Naomi Osaka got a rotten draw for Roland Garros - the toughest in the field, based on the average world ranking of likely opponents. She opens the tournament against No. 10 seed Paula Badosa, who is coming off a semifinal appearance at the most recent Slam in Australia.
Even if Osaka pulls off the opening-round upset, she likely would not open up her section of the draw by doing so. She most likely would face no players worse in the rankings than No. 44 in subsequent rounds.
Best opportunity for an unseeded player
World No. 64 Katie Volynets is in a good position to stay in Paris through the first few rounds. She'll face a qualifier, Joanna Garland, in the first round. Her most likely opponent in the second round is Yulia Putintseva, the event's 32nd - and final - seeded player.