The Australian Open is a major tennis tournament, part of the world Grand Slam series along with the U.S. Open in New York, Wimbledon in the UK, and the French Open in Paris. The Australian Open is held at The National Tennis Centre in Melbourne, Australia.
Let’s take a look at the history of the event, as well as some interesting statistics.
History of the Australian Open
The very first Australian Open was held in 1905, hosted by the Australasia Lawn Tennis Association — which later changed its name to the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia. It was a men-only event until 1922, when women played for the first time. In 1924, the Australian Open was officially designated a major championship by the International Lawn Tennis Federation.
Between 1905 and 1988, the Australian Open rotated between sites in Brisbane, Sydney, Adelaide, and Melbourne, but in 1988 it finally found a permanent home at Flinders Park — which later became Melbourne Park. This decision was largely because Melbourne attracted the most visitors, so it made sense to move the tournament there for good.
Before 1988 the Australian Open was played on grass, but the move to Flinders Park/Melbourne Park meant matches were played on hard courts for the first time. That meant Wimbledon would be the only major tournament played on grass.
The Australian Open is now one of the four slams attended by the best tennis players from all over the world, but for many years it lay on the fringes of international tennis due to Australia’s geographic isolation from the rest of the world. Thankfully, the rise of affordable trans-continental air travel has led to a rise in popularity and home-grown players no longer dominate the courts every January.
All-Time Stats
Famous Winners of the Australian Open include Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Naomi Osaka, and Serena Williams. Djokovic has won a record nine times in the Open Era; he has also won the most consecutive singles titles (three). Australia’s own Margaret Court is the women’s singles record-holder, with 11 titles between 1960 and 1972. Serena Williams comes in second with seven.
Viewing Stats
As you might expect given the Australian Open is a Grand Slam tournament, a lot of people watch the singles finals and many other matches. In the past, such events were something fans travelled to in person, but the rise of online streaming has led to a change in viewing habits — with betting on the Australian Open as popular as ever.
Data compiled from Eurosport found that digital viewing of Grand Slam tennis events increased by 20% in 2020, with tennis fans watching for around 36% longer. Viewership of the Australian Open is lower than other Grand Slam tournaments, mainly due to the time differences, but the men’s singles final still attracts a good audience. In 2020, at its peak, on average 2.043 million people watched the match between Novak Djokovic and Dominic Thiem. The women’s final was not quite as popular with viewers, but even the peak audience was still 1.6 million.
Sadly, the Covid-19 pandemic hit the Australian Open hard. Snap lockdowns have been a regular feature of Australia’s Covid policy and one such lockdown just before the 2021 tournament was due to take place proved to be disastrous. More than 100K tickets had to be refunded and because of Covid restrictions only 130K people attended the tournament in person — compared to more than 800K in 2020.
This loss badly impacted Tennis Australia, which was left severely out of pocket due to the steep fall in revenue. It wasn’t only the restricted visitor numbers that hit Tennis Australia hard; additional costs linked to Covid safety protocols also caused event costs to spiral. Tennis Australia reportedly lost millions of dollars and has been forced to take out a loan to cover its costs.
TV viewing figures were also down compared to previous years. The men’s final was watched by 1.17 million people, which was a lot less than the previous year, and only 850K people tuned in to see Naomi Osaka clinch victory in the women’s final. The most popular match was Nick Kyrgios’ defeat against Dominic Thiem in round three, which was watched by 1.8 million people.
Because of the shortfall in revenue, Channel Nine — which screens live footage of the event — has renegotiated its rights fee with Tennis Australia in lieu of compensation.
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