Australian Open 2026 Women’s Seed Report: Aryna Sabalenka Looks for Third Title Down Under

Women’s tennis is coming off another year of four different players winning the four majors. But don’t be fooled. This is not Any Given Sunday. This is not runaway parity with unreliable stars and anyone-can-beat-anyone openness. On the contrary, an elite group at the top is closely matched. The four majors in 2025? They went to the top three players—none a first-time major winner—and a veteran known for a decade as perhaps the hardest hitter.

In Australia, it’s difficult to envision a player outside of the top 10 taking the title. But in the group, there are all manner of complexities. Aryna Sabalenka, gunning for her third Australian Open title since 2023, is the favorite. But the pick here? How about Elena Rybakina, coming off her win in the WTA Finals, taking her second major title.

Our women’s seed report …

The top 16

1. Aryna Sabalenka

The winner of the previous major and 20 of her past 21 matches in Australia has to be the favorite. Initially known for erratic play, she has become a reliable second-week player. The hitch: She loses a lot of close, late-round matches (including two major finals and the 2025 WTA Finals final). She’s not invincible late in events. But there is so much to like. (And—to answer a question multiple readers raised last week—she’ll spend a day answering questions about/shaking off the blemish that was the “Battle of the Sexes”, then play will resume and all will be forgotten.)

2. Iga Świątek

The 24-year-old is going for the Career Slam (having ticked off Wimbledon last summer). Australia is a riddle she’s yet to crack, never advancing to the semifinals, and the faster the courts play, the more challenging. After two United Cup losses (despite Poland’s team win), she has lost four of her past five matches against top 10 opponents. But her game and athleticism are there. The Wimbledon result shows that she is capable of adjustment. And if she gets some help from the climate, so much the better.

3. Coco Gauff

Gauff is at a strange point in her career. She is—still—a top-three seed, guaranteed to steer clear of a higher-ranked opponent until the semifinals. She is a defending major winner. And she comes shrouded in questions. We know her serve and forehand can go off, but we also know she can play through her lapses. In miniature, she lost in the United Cup 6–0 in the third set when her technique deserted her, then she beat Świątek for the fourth consecutive time.

4. Amanda Anisimova

Now we know the answer to, How do you recover from losing 6–0, 6–0 in a major final? By reaching the final of the next major, including a takedown of the player who defeated you at Wimbledon. Anisimova is the winner of 12 of her past 14 major matches. She’s confident and relaxed, and she still possesses immaculate strokes. There is so much to like here.

5. Elena Rybakina

Coming off the second most significant title of her career (the WTA Finals in Riyadh, which also netted her $5.2 million), Rybakina is back, as it were. Shea has the biggest serve in the women’s game, paired with fearsome strokes (and court coverage that makes it hard to penetrate her defense). While determinedly private, any off-court drama seems to have subsided. She came within a few points of winning this event in 2023, and there is no reason she can’t contend in ’26.

6. Jessica Pegula

Simply put, a player worth emulating, Pegula maxes out everything she can control, avoids own-goals and competes uncompromisingly. Solid gets you so far … but only so far.

7. Jasmine Paolini

A year ago, the question was whether 2024 was a fluke or a new normal. Paolini answered that with panache. It’s still unclear if she has the weapons—starting with the serve—to win major singles titles. But extended brava to Paolini for her mid-career ascent, and the base camp she established.

8. Mirra Andreeva

The salon has divined that she is a future major winner, but she still has some steps to go.

9. Madison Keys

All eyes will be on the defending champion. She’s spoken openly about the pressure that she will have to confront, and yet, what better way to inflate confidence than telling yourself you arrive at a tournament having won your past seven matches there? Her results tailed off a bit in the second half of 2025, mainly due to injuries.

Pause here to note that four of the top nine seeds are American.

10. Belinda Bencic

She started 2025 ranked No. 487 and is now in the top 10 after her United Cup heroics. What a comeback. What a story. How long has she been around? At the 2018 Australian Open, she beat Venus Williams, then seeded No. 5, Pegula-like in her solid, veteran approach. Maybe a level short of power, but what an admirable player.

11. Ekaterina Alexandrova

In 2025, she achieved a career-high top 10 ranking, and it came in her 30s. Like fellow Russian Karen Khachanov, all she does is win a lot of matches and seldom takes bad losses.

12. Elina Svitolina

As her country, Ukraine, is still besieged, she charges on. (Svitolina is such an admirable player and a former U.S. Open semifinalist.)

13. Linda Nosková

They keep coming, these Czechs. Nosková is the latest to roll off the line. In 2025, she racked up 38 wins (many in the fall, a sign of durability), and she’s only 21.

14. Clara Tauson

The girls’ champion in 2019, Tauson is no Caroline Wozniacki (former champ), but she’s another Dane at the top of her game. Coming off a strong 2025, which included 36 wins, Tauson has a lot of power and improved movement, and is still only 23.

15. Emma Navarro

Is she ready for junior year after a minor sophomore slump?

16: Naomi Osaka

Now back with IMG, she is a two-time Australian Open champion, which automatically makes her a contender. But her last tour-level title was … the 2021 Australian Open.

Naomi Osaka will look to win her first major in five years in Melbourne. | Mike Frey-Imagn Images

Seeds 17-32

17. Victoria Mboko

She was outside the top 300 this time last year. Now, Mboko is a player to watch, and appears healthy from the wrist injury that marred her U.S. Open.

19. Karolina Muchová

At full health, she is a contender, but that’s, alas, a considerable conditional. She is also a former semifinalist in Melbourne.

20. Marta Kostyuk

Gentle reminder: You are duty-bound to root for Ukrainian players. The former Australian Open junior champion plays as her country suffers, and is coming off a series of big wins in Brisbane.

24. Jeļena Ostapenko

All major champions merit mention (though we are almost nine years removed from her 2017 French Open win).

27. Sofia Kenin

All former champions merit mention.

28: Emma Raducanu

All former hard-court major champions merit mention.

29. Iva Jovic

This marks her first major as a seed—and she just turned 18.

32. Markéta Vondroušová

All former major winners merit mention.

Dark horse pasture

Jéssica Bouzas Maneiro: She already clocked a win over Gauff (6–0 in the third set) in 2026.

Daria Kasatkina: This marks her first Australian Open as an Aussie.

Janice Tjen: She started 2025 ranked No. 412 and ended the year No. 53.

Alexandra Eala: The highest-ranked Filipina player (ever) is still in ascent.

Eva Lys: She’s a thoroughly likable player who, unexpectedly, reached Week 2 in 2025 (and took a set off Świątek last week).

Barbora Krejčíková: All two-time major winners merit mention.

Sloane Stephens: TV commentary can wait.

Maria Sakkari: Now 30, she is still too good to be outside the top 50—and showed signs of life last week.

First round matches to watch

Mboko vs. Emerson Jones: Aussie, Aussie Aussie!

Venus Williams vs. Olga Danilović: This is a tough matchup—tricky athletic lefty—for Venus.

Andreeva vs. Donna Vekić: A fine contrast match.

Kenin vs. Peyton Stearns: Feist vs. feist.

Upset special

Krejčíková d. Diana Shnaider

Doubles Winner

Taylor Townsend and Kateřina Siniaková

Semifinals

Sabalenka d. Gauff
Rybakina d. Świątek

Final

Rybakina d. Sabalenka