The record Aryna Sabalenka holds — and why no one else comes close

Aryna Sabalenka is the leader of a particular statistic related to her performance in Grand Slam tournaments, once again demonstrating why the Belarusian is the player with the best performances in Grand Slam events in recent years.

Beyond her four titles since the 2023 Australian Open, Sabalenka has been a constant name in the final rounds of practically every major in recent years. Since the beginning of 2023, in 12 main-draw appearances at Grand Slams, Sabalenka has reached 8 finals — winning the title in four of them — as well as three semifinals.

Her 'worst' result was the quarterfinals of Roland Garros 2024. During this period, she has already recorded 70 wins and only 8 losses, more than any other player on the Tour.

However, her consistency goes back even further, as even when she was defeated, the Belarusian usually managed to take at least one set. In fact, it has been almost six years since the last time Sabalenka lost a match at a Grand Slam without winning a set: back at the 2020 US Open, in the second round against Victoria Azarenka, when Sabalenka was just 22 years old and had only once reached the second week of a major.

And the fact is that Sabalenka’s record stands at an incredible total of 113 consecutive matches winning at least one set. She has a gap of more than 100 matches over the player in second place: four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka, who has only 12 consecutive matches since the last time she lost in straight sets. Further behind are Rybakina (11) and Kostyuk (6).

If Sabalenka’s statistic already looks impressive when compared to her colleagues on the WTA Tour, it becomes even more striking when compared to the men, as she even has more than Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz combined. In fact, Sinner — who holds the record among the men with 63 consecutive matches — would still need 50 more consecutive matches winning at least one set in each of his matches. With a maximum of seven matches in a single Grand Slam (in the case of reaching the final), Sinner would still need a couple of years before reaching a figure like Sabalenka’s.

Further back are Carlos Alcaraz (32), Casper Ruud (28), Arthur Fils (16), and Alexander Zverev (15). Even if any of the men were able to match Sabalenka’s 113 consecutive matches winning at least one set, the record becomes even more impressive on the women’s side, where matches are played as best-of-three sets — and not best-of-five as in men’s tennis.

Despite the defeat in the Australian Open final, Sabalenka still has positive conclusions to take away. It was the fourth consecutive Australian Open final she has played — although for the second straight year she will have to settle for being runner-up. As with her 2025 result (defeated in the final by Madison Keys), Sabalenka at least managed to defend her WTA ranking points, which keep her comfortably at No. 1.

And the defeat of Iga Swiatek in the quarterfinals also ended up being good news for the Belarusian, as the Pole dropped 350 ranking points, and Sabalenka extended her lead to more than 3,000 points — which mathematically guarantees that she will remain at the top during the next month, and leaves her in a strong position for what comes next in the season, without the pressure of a player who is still threatening her dominance.

Sabalenka will need to mentally regroup for her next challenges during the Middle East Swing, as she will travel to Qatar and the Dubai Tennis Championships — two tournaments that produced disappointing results in 2025 and which will serve as an opportunity for her to add points. Last year, across both tournaments, she managed just one win and suffered two defeats. Of the 16 tournaments she played in 2025, Qatar and Dubai were the only ones in which she failed to achieve at least two consecutive victories.