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Who Holds Tennis’s Major Singles Records?
Compare the leaders in major singles titles and match wins, plus tournament records, Calendar Slams, Career Slams and Golden Slams, with era context.
The headline Grand Slam tennis record is a tie at 24 singles titles: Margaret Court holds the women’s all-time mark and Novak Djokovic the men’s record. Serena Williams owns the women’s Open Era record with 23. Records here are current through September 30, 2026 and refer to senior singles unless stated otherwise.
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Sources: WTA and ATP Grand Slam records and the official tournament histories cited in the article. Figures are through September 30, 2026.
The Main Grand Slam Singles Records
| Record | Player | Total | What The Number Means |
|---|---|---|---|
| Women’s singles titles, all time | Margaret Court | 24 | Titles before and during the Open Era |
| Women’s singles titles, Open Era | Serena Williams | 23 | Titles since professionals were admitted to the majors |
| Men’s singles titles | Novak Djokovic | 24 | Men’s all-time record |
| Women’s major match wins | Serena Williams | 367 | Career singles matches won across the four majors |
| Men’s major match wins | Novak Djokovic | 409 | Career singles matches won through the 2026 US Open |
The WTA’s Grand Slam record book gives Court’s distribution as 11 Australian Opens, five Roland Garros titles, three Wimbledons and five US Opens. It also lists Williams on 23 and Steffi Graf on 22, making Williams the women’s leader for the Open Era that began in 1968 (WTA Grand Slam Honor Roll).
On the men’s side, Djokovic leads with 24 major singles titles, followed by Rafael Nadal with 22 and Roger Federer with 20. He also leads the men’s major match-win table with a 409–58 record, ahead of Federer’s 369 wins and Nadal’s 314, through the 2026 US Open (ATP Grand Slam records). Williams is the women’s major match-win leader with 367, according to the WTA (Williams career figures).
Titles and match wins answer different questions. A title total measures completed championship runs. Match wins add credit for deep runs that ended short of the trophy and therefore reflect longevity and appearances as well as conversion into titles. Neither number, by itself, measures serve quality or performance on pressure points.
Men’s and women’s match-win totals also should not be treated as a direct performance comparison. Men’s major singles matches are best of five sets, while women’s are best of three. Historical draw sizes and participation patterns have differed as well.
The Singles Title Leaders At Each Major
| Major | Men’s All-Time Leader | Women’s All-Time Leader |
|---|---|---|
| Australian Open | Novak Djokovic — 10 | Margaret Court — 11 |
| Roland Garros | Rafael Nadal — 14 | Chris Evert — 7 |
| Wimbledon | Roger Federer — 8 | Martina Navratilova — 9 |
| US Open | Bill Tilden, Bill Larned and Richard Sears — 7 | Molla Bjurstedt Mallory — 8 |
These are singles championship records across the full history of each event, not Open Era-only tables. That distinction changes the US Open answer: the men’s Open Era record is five, shared by Jimmy Connors, Pete Sampras and Federer; the women’s Open Era record is six, shared by Evert and Williams. The tournament’s official history separates those marks from the earlier all-time leaders (US Open championship records).
Court’s 11 Australian Open titles include seven before the tournament’s Open Era. Williams’s seven are the women’s Open Era record there, while Djokovic has four more men’s titles than Federer and Roy Emerson (Australian Open title leaders).
Nadal’s 14 Roland Garros titles are the clearest example of surface-specific dominance. He went 14–0 in finals and 112–4 overall at the tournament, a 96.5% match-winning rate (Roland-Garros). Evert’s seven Paris titles remain the women’s record (Roland-Garros).
Grand Slam, Career Grand Slam And Golden Slam
“Grand Slam” is often used casually to mean one major tournament. Strictly, winning the Grand Slam means taking the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and US Open singles titles in the same calendar year.
Only five singles players have done it:
- Don Budge: 1938
- Maureen Connolly: 1953
- Rod Laver: 1962 and 1969
- Margaret Court: 1970
- Steffi Graf: 1988
Laver is the only singles player to complete the calendar Grand Slam twice. Budge and Laver are the only men to achieve it; Djokovic came within one US Open final in 2021 (ATP). The WTA record book lists Connolly, Court and Graf as the three women.
A Career Grand Slam means winning each of the four at least once, with no requirement that the titles come in the same year.
A non-calendar-year Slam means holding all four simultaneously across two seasons. Williams did that twice, in 2002–03 and 2014–15. It is commonly called a “Serena Slam,” but it is not a calendar Grand Slam (WTA).
A Golden Slam adds Olympic singles gold. Graf remains the only player to win all four majors and Olympic singles gold in one calendar year, doing so in 1988 (Olympics.com). A Career Golden Slam is the corresponding achievement completed across a career rather than one season.
Why Era Labels Change The Record
The Open Era divided tennis history because earlier majors did not admit professional players. Draw sizes, travel patterns, tournament scheduling, court surfaces and access to the Australian championships also changed substantially.
The WTA record book, for example, lists 32- and 64-player Australian Open women’s draws in earlier Open Era editions, compared with the 128-player draw used after the event’s 1986 calendar transition. No Australian Open was held in 1986.
That does not invalidate older titles or make modern totals automatically superior. It means the cleanest record statement includes three pieces: event, discipline and era. “Court has 24 major singles titles,” “Williams has 23 in the Open Era” and “Djokovic has the men’s record of 24” are precise. “The Grand Slam record is 24” is incomplete.
The same principle applies to unusual match records. Duration depends heavily on scoring rules, as the longest tennis match records demonstrate. A record is descriptive first; its competitive meaning comes from the format, surface and opportunity behind it.