The US Open's player payout reaches $108m as the four majors create a player council

The US Open will pay players $108 million this year, the largest compensation package in the history of tennis. That is 20 per cent more than last year and 44 per cent more than in 2024 — the cost of talent at the sport's most commercial event has risen by nearly half in two years.

The singles champions take $5.5 million each, up from $5 million. But the more consequential number is at the other end of the draw: simply making the 128-player main draw is now worth $140,000, the largest first-round payment tennis has offered. A quarter-finalist earns $780,000, a semi-finalist $1.45 million and the runner-up $2.8 million. Doubles winners share $1 million per team, runners-up $500,000, and the wheelchair singles champions take $104,000.

Alongside the prize fund, the United States Tennis Association is putting $2 million into a new Player Support Program, split equally between the men's and women's fields, to fund benefits and top up existing pension arrangements.

The players get a council as well as a cheque

On the same day, the Australian Open, Roland-Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open jointly announced a Grand Slam Player Advisory Council — the first standing body through which players will feed into how the four majors are run. It launches after this year's US Open. The majors say they are still shaping its composition and operating framework with player input, and that players will be invited to apply for seats.

Both announcements answer the same pressure. For roughly two years the leading players have pushed the four tournaments for a larger share of the revenue they generate, and for a formal say in decisions that affect them. Prize money was always the visible part of that argument; representation was the harder part, and it is the part that moved this week.

What it costs an event to keep its talent

Craig Tiley, the USTA's chief executive, called the money "a significant first step in a multiyear investment in athletes" and said it makes the US Open "the best economic opportunity for players" in the sport — language that treats prize money as a competitive instrument rather than a fixed cost of staging the tournament.

That framing matters beyond tennis. A flagship event competes for the performers who fill its stands and its broadcast slots, and when those performers organise, the bidding is against the other events in the same calendar. The council is the more interesting concession, because a seat at the table is harder to take back than a percentage.