Elena Rybakina needed one more match win this year to make certain she finishes 2026 at No. 1. She took it at the first chance, beating fellow Kazakh Yulia Putintseva 6-2, 6-3 in the second round of the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo on Thursday, more than a week before the WTA Finals begin.
It is the first time Rybakina has secured the year-end No. 1 ranking. She took the weekly top spot from Aryna Sabalenka on 14 September after beating her in the US Open final, and Thursday’s win means Sabalenka, the world No. 2, can no longer overtake her before the season ends.
Rybakina, the top seed, had a first-round bye at the Ariake Coliseum. Putintseva came through qualifying and beat Maria Sakkari in the first round to set up the all-Kazakh meeting.
Two days earlier Rybakina had said she wanted it settled in Tokyo rather than left for Indian Wells. “The earlier I can confirm it the better,” she said. “For me it’s important just to get some matches and be prepared for the final eight. If I can make sure here after a win that I am going to stay number one then great, if not I will have another chance at the final eight.”
The season. Rybakina has won four titles in 2026, more than any other player: the Australian Open, Stuttgart, the US Open and, last Sunday, Ningbo, where she defended a title for the first time in her career. Ningbo was the 15th title of her career. The autumn was not smooth. She lost her opening match in Beijing to the 118th-ranked Alina Charaeva and then missed Wuhan with a foot injury, which she said this week was “getting better every day.”
“After the US Open I didn’t do much and in Beijing I wasn’t at my best at all,” she said. “Physically, mentally I was really tired so I feel like these tournaments now are really good practice for me.”
The list. Sabalenka finished 2024 and 2025 at No. 1. Before her, Iga Swiatek held the year-end top spot in 2022 and 2023, Ashleigh Barty from 2019 to 2021, Simona Halep in 2017 and 2018 and Angelique Kerber in 2016. Rybakina, the 2022 Wimbledon champion, now has three major titles, and she beat Sabalenka in both hard-court major finals this year. How the year-end ranking is settled, and why the Race to the Finals does not decide it, is set out in GTN’s WTA year-end No. 1 explainer.
What comes next. Rybakina plays Leylah Fernandez in the quarterfinals, a rematch of the Ningbo final, which Rybakina won 6-2, 6-2. Fernandez beat Elise Mertens 6-2, 7-6(8) to get there, and Rybakina leads their head-to-head 4-2. After Tokyo she goes to Indian Wells as the defending champion at the WTA Finals, which run from 8 to 15 November.
