Over a million spectators ed through the gates during last year’s Australian Open, making it the highest-attended Tennis Grand Slam of all time.
In 2025, the “Happy Slam” continued its record-breaking streak, surging past last year’s attendance figures, cementing itself as the Grand Slam of the Asia-Pacific market and one of the nation’s most cherished and popular festivals.
A rising tide lifts all bets 25dh
Against this backdrop, Tennis’s popularity as a betting sport is also growing. It is currently Entain’s fifth most popular sport across our global brands, with the biggest markets in the USA, Spain, Brazil, and the UK.
Despite players from these markets often being extremely popular, American Madison Keys remained a surprise package by winning the women’s singles. She secured her first Grand Slam title by defeating top-seeded players Iga Swiatek and Aryna Sabalenka in consecutive matches, who took most of the backing.
It was a different story in the men's final, where the more popular Jannik Sinner defended his 2024 crown by overcoming Alexander Zverev, completing a men’s draw impacted by one-sided matches & retirements. This was reflected in this year's later rounds, which saw an average of 3.13 sets per match, compared to 4 sets in 2024.
From a betting perspective, the Australian Open does suffer from the tournament's time zone being less ideal for Western and American audiences, but with longer events and deeper pools, it and the other majors are still by far the most popular events on the tour.
Across Entain, the US Open remains the most popular, in part due to our large US customer base. Surprisingly, the French Open is typically a more popular betting event than Wimbledon because matches on clay take longer to complete than those on grass. Understanding why is fundamental to understanding the growth in Tennis betting.
Tennis’ popularity derives from in-play betting 3q1z5q
Roughly 90% of the bets placed on Tennis each year at Entain are staked on in-play, and no other major sport comes close to matching this share of live bets.
Tennis is now the second most bet-on sport in the UK and US markets for in-play, behind football and basketball, respectively. In the US, it has attracted more live bets than American Football in each of the last three years.
This in-play betting can be simplified into its top three markets of Match Betting, Current Game Winner and Set Winner. These consistently for about 85% of in-play stakes. Match Betting remains the most popular, but Game Winner is running it close.
While many players enjoy the quick settlement aspect, in-play is also hugely popular due to a phenomenon known as momentum swings, which those betting on tennis often love to try and predict and use to their advantage.
Momentum is about which player is in control at any point of the match. These swings were once seen as common at the beginning of a set or caused by unexpected events such as double faults or a Hawkeye challenge, but they can appear at any time. The mentally draining aspect of the sport is still relatively unknown, even for bookmakers, yet it is often a big factor in the outcome of a match.
How has the market judged the Australian Open 2025? 19465j
There has been a changing of the guard in men’s tennis with the recent retirements of Rafa Nadal, Roger Federer, and Andy Murray. Only Novak Djokovic remains as popular with punters as he was several years ago. Of the favourites, Carlos Alcaraz had the highest backing of the market to win the tournament, until his defeat to Djokovic in the quarterfinals.
Around 60% of tennis bets across Entain are on the men’s game. One reason is that men play best-of-five sets compared to best-of-three for women, creating longer games and, therefore, more opportunities for in-play betting.
However, stakes rose substantially on the women’s side at the Australian Open 2025, due to a deeper and more even field. It was still the top two seeds, Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek, who were the most popular with customers to win the tournament.
There is also the case of Patriotic Punting to consider. American punters especially like to get behind the leading players such as Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula in the women’s game and Ben Shelton and Taylor Fritz in the men’s game. Despite this, the eventual winner, America’s Madison Keys, remained relatively unbacked even through the final, winning her first major after more than a decade on the tour.
Brazil’s rising star Joao Fonseca was heavily backed in the men's singles. He has been gaining a lot of traction globally following a good winning run at the end of last year. Having made it through qualification, he knocked out ninth seed Andrey Rublev in the first round before falling in the second round to Lorenzo Sonego. A name to keep an eye on this year.
Future of tennis trading 4n296d
At Entain, we’re always looking to add more markets, which will mean more in-play options to match the sport’s unique popularity. The growing popularity of Bet Builders in other sports, such as football and American Football, will also likely pave the way for their introduction to tennis.