A seed is the draw's forecast of who should go deep, so an unseeded champion is a forecast that failed. We read the seed or entry code beside every finalist in all 468 singles draws of the Open Era, 234 per tour, and followed each unseeded champion match by match; champions and seeds were checked against the WTA's records and the ATP Tour's draws, and the rankings are the two tours' own. How the No. 1 seed fares is in our piece on the top seed's win rate.
How many unseeded players have won a Grand Slam
The French Open has had the most unseeded champions, six: Mats Wilander, Gustavo Kuerten and Gaston Gaudio among the men, Jelena Ostapenko, Iga Swiatek and Barbora Krejcikova among the women. The US Open has had four and the Australian Open and Wimbledon three each. Every major has had at least one unseeded champion on each side.
| Year | Major | Champion | Entry | Ranking | Seeds beaten | Beat in the final |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1976 | Australian Open | Mark Edmondson | Direct | 212 | 5 of 6 | John Newcombe (2) |
| 1978 | Australian Open | Chris O'Neil | Direct | Not on record | 2 of 5 | Betsy Nagelsen (8) |
| 1982 | French Open | Mats Wilander | Direct | 18 | 4 of 7 | Guillermo Vilas (3) |
| 1985 | Wimbledon | Boris Becker | Direct | 20 | 4 of 7 | Kevin Curren (8) |
| 1994 | US Open | Andre Agassi | Direct | 20 | 5 of 7 | Michael Stich (4) |
| 1997 | French Open | Gustavo Kuerten | Direct | 66 | 3 of 7 | Sergi Bruguera (16) |
| 2001 | Wimbledon | Goran Ivanisevic | Wildcard | 125 | 4 of 7 | Patrick Rafter (3) |
| 2004 | French Open | Gaston Gaudio | Direct | 44 | 4 of 7 | Guillermo Coria (3) |
| 2007 | Australian Open | Serena Williams | Direct | 81 | 6 of 7 | Maria Sharapova (1) |
| 2009 | US Open | Kim Clijsters | Wildcard | Unranked | 5 of 7 | Caroline Wozniacki (9) |
| 2017 | French Open | Jelena Ostapenko | Direct | 47 | 4 of 7 | Simona Halep (3) |
| 2017 | US Open | Sloane Stephens | Direct | 83 | 5 of 7 | Madison Keys (15) |
| 2020 | French Open | Iga Swiatek | Direct | 54 | 3 of 7 | Sofia Kenin (4) |
| 2021 | French Open | Barbora Krejcikova | Direct | 33 | 5 of 7 | Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (31) |
| 2021 | US Open | Emma Raducanu | Qualifier | 150 | 2 of 7 | Leylah Fernandez |
| 2023 | Wimbledon | Marketa Vondrousova | Direct | 42 | 5 of 7 | Ons Jabeur (6) |
The two lists have moved in opposite directions. The men's seven came one or two a decade from 1976 to 2004. The women's went 111 majors without one, from Chris O'Neil at the 1978 Australian Open to Serena Williams, ranked 81st, at the 2007 Australian Open, and eight of the nine came from 2007 on.
Unseeded women's Grand Slam champions in the 2020s
Four of the 27 women's majors since 2020 went to an unseeded player, 15 percent, against five of the 207 before, 2.4 percent. Counting from Ostapenko at the 2017 French Open to Vondrousova at Wimbledon in 2023, the share was six of 25.
- Iga Swiatek, French Open 2020. Ranked 54th, she beat the No. 1 seed, Simona Halep, 6-1, 6-2 in the fourth round and did not lose a set in seven matches.
- Barbora Krejcikova, French Open 2021. Ranked 33rd, she beat five seeds, the last of them Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, seeded 31st, in the final.
- Emma Raducanu, US Open 2021. A qualifier ranked 150th, she won 10 matches, three of them in qualifying, without losing a set. Her final against Leylah Fernandez, ranked 73rd, is the only major final of the Open Era between two unseeded players.
- Marketa Vondrousova, Wimbledon 2023. Ranked 42nd, she beat five seeds, Ons Jabeur, the sixth, in the final, and is the only unseeded women's champion at Wimbledon in the Open Era.
The run has stopped for now: all 13 women's majors since Vondrousova's title went to seeded players. Before 2017 there had been three unseeded women's champions, O'Neil, Williams and Kim Clijsters at the 2009 US Open; Williams beat six seeds in Melbourne, the most of any of the 16, finishing with the No. 1 seed, Maria Sharapova, in the final.
The last unseeded man to win a Grand Slam
Gaston Gaudio at the 2004 French Open is the last unseeded man to win a major, and the 89 men's majors since then have all gone to seeds, the longest such run of the Open Era; the previous longest was 36, between Boris Becker at Wimbledon in 1985 and Andre Agassi at the 1994 US Open. Gaudio won the final from two sets down against the third seed, Guillermo Coria. The seven:
- Mark Edmondson, 1976 Australian Open: ranked 212th, he beat five seeds in a row, ending with the No. 1, Ken Rosewall, and the No. 2, John Newcombe, and is still the last Australian man to win it.
- Mats Wilander, 1982 French Open: ranked 18th.
- Boris Becker, Wimbledon 1985: ranked 20th, the first unseeded men's champion at Wimbledon in the Open Era.
- Andre Agassi, 1994 US Open: ranked 20th, with five seeds beaten.
- Gustavo Kuerten, 1997 French Open: ranked 66th.
- Goran Ivanisevic, Wimbledon 2001: a wildcard ranked 125th, the only wildcard to win a men's major in the Open Era.
- Gaston Gaudio, 2004 French Open: ranked 44th.
Unseeded men still reach finals: they have lost 23, most recently Nick Kyrgios at Wimbledon in 2022. In all, unseeded men have won 7 of their 30 appearances in major finals, and unseeded women 9 of 24.
The lowest-ranked Grand Slam champions, qualifiers and wildcards
Of the 14 with a ranking on record, Edmondson's 212th is the lowest, and the Australian Open calls him the lowest-ranked man ever to win a Grand Slam singles title. Raducanu, 150th, and Ivanisevic, 125th, come next. Kim Clijsters won the 2009 US Open with no ranking at all, on a wildcard, and Chris O'Neil's ranking in 1978 is not in the WTA's records.
Thirteen of the 16 got into the main draw directly. The exceptions are the one qualifier, Raducanu, and the two wildcards, Ivanisevic and Clijsters. At the other end, Wilander, ranked 18th, and Becker and Agassi, both 20th, were unseeded in draws that seeded only 16 players; a top-20 ranking earns a seed in today's 32-seed draws.
From 16 seeds to 32: what changed in 2001
The majors began seeding 32 players in 2001, from Wimbledon that year, after two decades of 16. That made unseeded a stricter label: a player now has to be outside roughly the top 32 to lack a seed. Yet titles from outside the top 16 seeds became more common afterward, not less, and only in the women's draw.
| Seeding | Majors per tour | Unseeded men's champions | Unseeded women's champions | Champions seeded 17-32, men / women |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 seeds: 1982 French Open to 2001 French Open | 77 | 4 | 0 | Not used |
| 32 seeds: Wimbledon 2001 to 2026 US Open | 101 | 2 | 8 | 3 / 7 |
In the 77 majors with 16 seeds, four men and no women won unseeded. In the 101 since, two men and eight women won unseeded and three men and seven women won seeded 17th to 32nd, so 15 women's titles have gone to players outside the top 16 seeds against none before, while the men's figure went from four to five. The share of titles won by every seed since 2000 is in the seed-by-seed breakdown.
Unseeded players at the 2026 Grand Slams
All eight 2026 champions were seeded, the lowest Linda Noskova, ninth at Wimbledon. The closest an unseeded player came was Maja Chwalinska, a Polish qualifier ranked 114th, who beat the 25th seed, Diana Shnaider, in the semifinals and lost the French Open final 6-3, 6-2 to Mirra Andreeva, the eighth seed. She is the only qualifier besides Raducanu to reach a major singles final in the Open Era.
Three unseeded men reached the semifinals and went no further: Matteo Arnaldi at the French Open, who gave the 10th seed, Flavio Cobolli, a walkover there, and the wildcard Arthur Fery at Wimbledon and Karen Khachanov at the US Open, both beaten by Alexander Zverev. The draws of the tournaments in play, with each player's seed, are on the Vertize tennis scores page, and the rest of the season is in the tennis section.
Unseeded Grand Slam champions: frequently asked questions
How many unseeded players have won a Grand Slam? Sixteen in the Open Era, from the 1968 French Open to the 2026 US Open: seven men and nine women, out of 468 singles titles.
Who was the last unseeded man to win a Grand Slam? Gaston Gaudio, at the 2004 French Open. Every one of the 89 men's majors since has gone to a seeded player.
Has a qualifier ever won a Grand Slam? Once in the Open Era: Emma Raducanu at the 2021 US Open, ranked 150th, who won three qualifying matches and seven in the main draw without losing a set.
Who is the lowest-ranked man to win a Grand Slam? Mark Edmondson, ranked 212th when he won the 1976 Australian Open. Among the unseeded women's champions with a ranking on record, Emma Raducanu was the lowest, 150th, and Kim Clijsters won the 2009 US Open with no ranking.
Which Grand Slam has the most unseeded champions? The French Open, with six: three men and three women.
How this was built: every singles draw at the four majors from the 1968 French Open, the first open to professionals, to the 2026 US Open, 234 per tour (two Australian Opens in 1977, none in 1986, no Wimbledon in 2020), read from the Wikipedia draw pages through the MediaWiki API: the seed or entry code beside each finalist, the number of seeds and every match of each unseeded champion. Every champion was checked against Wikipedia's lists of Grand Slam champions, and the 212 women's champions in the WTA's tournament records against those records, which give a seed to none of the unseeded ones. Every men's final since 2000 matches the ATP Tour's draws, seeds included, and the seeded opponents of each unseeded champion since 2000 match the ATP draws and the WTA's match records. Rankings are the ATP's on the last list before each event and, for women since 2000, the WTA's. Unseeded means no seed number in the draw. Data collected October 14, 2026.