Zeynep Sönmez
Zeynep Sönmez is a Turkish professional tennis player. She has career-high rankings of No. 69 in singles and No. 382 in doubles by the WTA, achieved in 2025. Sönmez has won one singles title on the WTA Tour and four singles titles on the ITF Women's Circuit. She is currently the No. 1 singles player from Turkey.
Sönmez competes for Turkey in the Billie Jean King Cup, where she has a win/loss record of 5–3 as of February 2025.
Career
2023: WTA Tour debut, Turkish No. 1
In June 2023, Sönmez made her WTA Tour debut at the Rosmalen Open in the Netherlands as a qualifier. She reached her first WTA 125 final at the Zavarovalnica Sava Ljubljana, but lost to Marina Bassols Ribera in straight sets.2024: First WTA Tour title, major & top 100 debuts
Sönmez made her WTA 1000 debut as a wildcard into the Qatar Ladies Open but lost to Lesia Tsurenko. Ranked No. 157, she qualified for her first major main draw at the French Open by defeating Dejana Radanović, Aliaksandra Sasnovich, and Jana Fett in qualifying. She was the first Turkish woman to play in the main draw of the French Open since Çağla Büyükakçay and İpek Soylu in 2017.In the beginning of the grass-court season, she qualified for the main draw at the Berlin Ladies Open with upset wins over two qualifying seeds, top seed Dayana Yastremska, her first top 30 win, and ninth seed Emina Bektas. She then defeated lucky loser Arantxa Rus in the first round, recording her first WTA main-draw win. She lost to Victoria Azarenka in the round of 16. As a result, she reached a new career-high singles ranking of No. 136 on 24 June 2024 before the Wimbledon Championships, where she reached the third round of qualifying.
In September, Sönmez reached her first WTA Tour quarterfinal at the Jasmin Open, going through qualifying, and defeated Rebeka Masarova and sixth seed Greet Minnen. She was the first Turkish player to reach a quarterfinal on the tour since 2017, after both Çağla Büyükakçay and Başak Eraydın made quarterfinals in Istanbul. She lost in the last eight to Eva Lys. Ranked No. 148, at the WTA 500 Pan Pacific Open, she qualified for the main draw and upset seventh seed Magdalena Fręch for her second top 30 win.
In November, at the Mérida Open, Sönmez defeated sixth seed María Lourdes Carlé, Elsa Jacquemot, top seed Renata Zarazúa, reaching her first WTA semifinal, and finally Alina Korneeva, making her first final. She defeated Ann Li in straight sets to win her first tour-level singles title and became the first player from Turkey to win a WTA singles title since Çağla Büyükakçay in Istanbul in 2016 and only the second overall. As a result, she reached the top 100 for the first time in her career, at world No. 91 on 4 November 2024.
2025: First Turkish player in a major third round
Making her debut at the [2025 2025 Australian Open – Women's singles|Australian Open – Women's singles|Australian Open], Sönmez lost in the first round to wildcard entrant Talia Gibson in three sets.Defending her title at the Mérida Open, which had been upgraded to a WTA 500 event and switched from October to February, she recorded wins over eighth seed Maria Sakkari and Magda Linette to make it through to the quarterfinals, where she lost to top seed and eventual champion Emma Navarro.
In May at the Rabat Grand Prix, Sönmez overcame third seed Lucia Bronzetti, before losing to wildcard entrant Anastasija Sevastova in the second round. The following week at the French Open, she lost in the first round to 13th seed Elina Svitolina in straight sets.
At Wimbledon, Sönmez defeated Jaqueline Cristian and Wang Xinyu to become the first player from Turkey to reach the third round of a Grand Slam tournament in the Open Era. Her run was ended in the third round by 18th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova.
In August, Sönmez made her main-draw debut at the US Open and overcame qualifier Katie Volynets, before losing to 27th seed Marta Kostyuk in the second round.
2026: Historic Australian Open third round
In November 2025, it was announced that Tunisian tennis player Ons Jabeur and her longtime coach Issam Jellali would be joining Sönmez's team as a mentor and her head coach, respectively, in the 2026 season.At the 2026 Australian Open, the first Grand Slam tournament of the season, Zeynep Sönmez entered the competition through the qualifying rounds. She won three consecutive qualifying matches to secure a place in the main draw.
In the first round of the women’s singles main draw, Sönmez defeated world No. 11 Ekaterina Alexandrova in three sets and advanced to the second round, the first Turkish woman to record a Grand Slam win at the Australian Open in the Open Era. She reached the third round with a defeat over Anna Bondár becoming the first Turkish player in the Open Era to reach the third round of the Australian Open.
Performance timeline
''Only main-draw results in WTA Tour, Grand Slam tournaments, Billie Jean King Cup and Olympic Games are included in win–loss records.''Singles
''Current through the 2026 Australian Open.''WTA Tour finals
Singles: 1 (title)
| Result | W–L | Date | Tournament | Tier | Surface | Opponent | Score | ||||||||||||||
| Win | 1–0 | [2024 Mérida Open – Singles|] | Mérida Open, Mexico | WTA 250 | Hard |  ITF Circuit finalsSingles: 8 (4 titles, 4 runner-ups)
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