{"id":322761,"date":"2025-12-18T12:46:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T12:46:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/322761\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T12:46:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T12:46:11","slug":"gauff-is-forbes-highest-paid-female-athlete-for-second-straight-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/322761\/","title":{"rendered":"Gauff is Forbes’ highest-paid female athlete for second straight year"},"content":{"rendered":"

Forbes has released its list for the world\u2019s 20 highest-paid female athletes of 2025<\/a>, and the WTA Tour\u2019s biggest stars accounted for half of the rankings.<\/p>\n

Four of the top five highest-paid athletes play on the WTA Tour, including the top three led by Coco Gauff who brought in an estimated $33 million.<\/p>\n

In determining rankings, Forbes factored in both on-court and off-court earnings. On-court earnings, rounded to the nearest $100,000, included prize money, bonuses, salaries and stipends. Off-court figures, rounded to the nearest $1 million, included earnings from endorsements, licensing, appearances and memorabilia.<\/p>\n

Gauff, who was recently named to Forbes 30 Under 30 list in the sports category<\/a>, led the rankings for the second straight year.<\/p>\n

With titles at Roland Garros and Wuhan, the World No. 3 accrued approximately $8 million on the court, but most of her earnings came from endorsement deals with New Balance, Bose, Rolex, Mercedes Benz and more that totaled $25 million — that\u2019s the most off-court income by any female athlete on the rankings.<\/p>\n

Closely behind Gauff is World No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka, who\u2019s portfolio of $30 million ranked second on the list.<\/p>\n

Sabalenka, who finished as the year-end No. 1 for the second consecutive year, set the single-season record with $15 million in prize money that included her US Open title defense in September. Sponsored by brands such as Nike, Audemars Piguet and Master & Dynamic, her off-court earnings totaled $15 million as well.<\/p>\n

Rounding out the top five, Iga Swiatek, who won 62 WTA Tour-level matches and her first Wimbledon singles title, ranked third with $25.1 million.<\/p>\n

Zheng Qinwen, who won just $1.6 million in prize money because of an elbow injury that limited her season, earned $21 million off-court through deals with Audi, Dior and Vogue China<\/a> to total for a fifth-best $22.6 million.<\/p>\n

2025 Australian Open champion Madison Keys ($13.4 million), four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka ($12.5 million), WTA Finals champion Elena Rybakina ($12.5 million) and World No. 5 Jessica Pegula ($12.3 million) all cracked the top 10.<\/p>\n

Rybakina\u2019s $8.5 million in prize money was boosted by a $5.235 million prize for her title in Riyadh<\/a>, the largest payout in women\u2019s sports history.<\/p>\n

Top 10 players Amanda Anisimova ($11.3 million) and Jasmine Paolini ($8.3 million) were the final two tennis athletes on the list, ranking No. 12 and No. 17, respectively.<\/p>\n

Freestyle skier Eileen Gu was the highest-paid non-tennis athlete with $23 million in earnings. American golfer Kelly Norda ($13 million) and WNBA stars Caitlin Clark ($12.1 million), Sabrina Ionescu ($10.5 million) and Angel Reese ($9.4 million) were among other notable athletes on the list.<\/p>\n

All athletes had to be active during the 12-month period. Seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams was not included because of her limited appearances in 2025.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To check out the full rankings, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Forbes has released its list for the world\u2019s 20 highest-paid female athletes of 2025, and the WTA Tour\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":322762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,1602,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-322761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-text","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}