New Queen’s tournament to offer equal prize money for women by 2029

The LTA has pledged to secure equal prize money for the new women’s tennis tournament held at Queen’s and the mixed event in Eastbourne by 2029 at the latest.

Women’s tennis will return to The Queen’s Club in Baron’s Court, London for the first time in more than 50 years next week in the form of a WTA 500 event, one week before the annual men’s ATP 500 event at Queen’s. The player list includes Madison Keys, Elena Rybakina, Emma Raducanu and Katie Boulter.

The women’s prize pot will stand at US$1.415m (£1.042m), the highest purse on offer at a WTA 500 event of its draw size on the tour this year. Despite the notable figure, the women’s prize money is still around half of the offering for the ATP event, which currently stands at $2,882,544 (£2,124,031).

At the WTA Eastbourne event, which has been downgraded to a WTA 250 event in order to make space for the new event at Queen’s, the prize money will rise to $389,000 (£286,570), making it the highest paying WTA 250 event on the tour. However, the ATP event’s offering of $865,000 (£637,221) is still considerably higher. The LTA has voluntarily added a total of £397,738 to its women’s events this year compared to the minimum prize money required by the WTA.

Grass court events are particularly expensive to run and, according to the LTA, the events it held in 2024 operated at a loss of £4m in 2024 despite the success of the ATP Queen’s event. However, the organisation intends to gradually increase its prize money commitment to the WTA over time and it is hopeful that the Queen’s WTA event will eventually become profitable.

The WTA event in Queen’s has had positive returns as the tournament nears. More than 80% of tickets have already been sold for the tournament. Part of the LTA’s motivation for returning women’s tennis to Queen’s was for the tournament to appeal to a more diverse fanbase and 55% of ticket purchasers for the Queen’s WTA 500 event have been female.

“We are making significant increases this year to the women’s prize money at Queens and Eastbourne and want to achieve equal prize money as soon as possible,” said Scott Lloyd, the LTA CEO, in a statement. “The LTA is committed to growing women’s tennis, both at professional and grass-roots level and this move is an important part of that commitment.

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