The Dubai Tennis Championships bring leading men’s and women’s professional tennis to Dubai across two consecutive tournament weeks.
The women compete in a WTA 1000 event, followed by the men’s ATP 500 tournament. Both are played on outdoor hard courts at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium, making the event an established part of the Middle East swing on the international tennis calendar.
The 2026 edition has now been completed, with Jessica Pegula winning the women’s singles title and Daniil Medvedev taking the men’s championship.
The event is unusual because the men’s and women’s tournaments are staged separately rather than running as one combined draw during the same week.
Women’s competition comes first as a WTA 1000 event. The men then take over the venue for the ATP 500 tournament.
That distinction matters because the two weeks use different draw sizes, rankings points and tour structures even though they share the same venue and overall tournament identity.
For spectators, it effectively creates two major professional tennis events back to back in Dubai.
The championships are held at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium within the Aviation Club complex in Dubai.
Matches are played on outdoor hard courts, a surface that generally offers a balance between attacking and defensive tennis rather than strongly favouring one style.
The venue allows day and evening sessions, which is particularly useful in Dubai because temperatures and playing conditions can change noticeably as the sun goes down.
Evening matches also form an important part of the event’s identity, with the main court operating under stadium lighting.
The women’s tournament is one of the higher-level regular events on the WTA Tour.
In 2026, the singles draw contained 56 players and the doubles draw 28 teams. The tournament ran from 15 to 21 February.
A 56-player singles draw means some leading seeds can receive byes while other players begin in the opening round, depending on the tournament structure and entries.
Players progress through a standard knockout format. Lose a match and the singles run ends; win and the player advances to the next round until the champion is decided.
Jessica Pegula won the 2026 Dubai women’s singles championship by defeating Elina Svitolina 6–2, 6–4 in the final.
It was Pegula’s fourth WTA 1000 title and her tenth WTA singles title overall.
Gabriela Dabrowski and Luisa Stefani won the women’s doubles event, defeating Laura Siegemund and Vera Zvonareva in the final.
The results added another set of champions to a tournament whose previous winners include players such as Justine Henin, Venus Williams and Simona Halep.
The men’s tournament follows the women’s event at the same venue.
The 2026 ATP 500 ran from 23 to 28 February and used a 32-player singles draw and 16-team doubles draw.
As an ATP 500 event, Dubai sits above ATP 250 tournaments but below Masters 1000 events in the regular ATP hierarchy.
The category affects the ranking points available, the level of field the tournament can attract and its position within the wider ATP calendar.
Daniil Medvedev became the 2026 men’s singles champion without playing the scheduled final.
Tallon Griekspoor had defeated Andrey Rublev in the semi-final but suffered a hamstring injury during that match. He was unable to recover in time for the final, giving Medvedev the title by walkover.
The championship was Medvedev’s 23rd tour-level singles title.
In men’s doubles, Harri Heliovaara and Henry Patten defeated Marcelo Arévalo and Mate Pavić 7–5, 7–5 to win the title.
WTA 1000 and ATP 500 belong to two different tour systems, so their numbers should not be compared as though they represent the same ranking scale.
The WTA classifies its women’s event in Dubai as WTA 1000.
The ATP classifies the men’s tournament as ATP 500.
Both categories indicate significant tour events, but the ranking structures, mandatory-event rules, draw formats and points systems are administered independently by the WTA and ATP.
The useful comparison is therefore within each tour rather than between the numbers 1000 and 500 themselves.
The men’s tournament was established in 1993.
The women’s event was introduced in 2001 and developed into one of the leading WTA tournaments in the region.
Over that period Dubai has hosted many of the most prominent players of their generations.
Roger Federer holds the men’s singles record with eight Dubai titles, illustrating how frequently the event attracted the strongest players during his career.
The women’s event has also built a long list of repeat champions and major-title winners.
Dubai does not sit in isolation on the professional tennis calendar.
Players often move through several Middle Eastern tournaments during this phase of the season, particularly across the Gulf.
This gives them a sequence of events with relatively similar travel demands and hard-court conditions before the calendar moves into later parts of the season.
For Dubai, it also creates a period in which international tennis receives sustained regional attention rather than appearing for only one isolated weekend.
Outdoor tennis is affected by temperature, sunlight, wind and humidity.
During the day, warmer conditions can change how quickly the ball moves through the court and how players manage physically over long matches.
Evening sessions bring cooler conditions and artificial lighting, which can slightly change the feel of the ball and court.
These differences do not change the rules, but players may adjust positioning, shot selection and preparation according to the conditions they encounter.
Singles naturally receives most of the public attention, but Dubai also stages full professional doubles competitions.
Doubles uses the same basic court dimensions with the doubles alleys included, but movement and tactics differ significantly.
Net positioning, reflexes, serving patterns and communication between partners become particularly important.
This creates a different style of tennis even when many of the same players and the same hard courts are involved.
The tournament’s official site currently lists the next Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships for 14–27 February 2027.
The full daily schedule, draws and player lists are confirmed closer to the tournament, so those details should be checked again before attending or following a specific session.
What is already clear is that the familiar structure remains: women’s and men’s professional tennis staged consecutively at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium.
The tennis championships are part of a broader programme of international sport hosted across the Emirates.
Dubai stages major tennis early in the year, while Abu Dhabi closes the Formula 1 season at Yas Marina.
Fans following both sports can use the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix guide to understand the other major UAE event covered in our current sports section.
The two competitions are very different, but both illustrate the UAE’s recurring role as a host for established international tours and championships.
The simplest way to understand the Dubai Tennis Championships is to treat the two weeks separately.
The women compete at WTA 1000 level before the men arrive for the ATP 500 event. Both tournaments use knockout draws on outdoor hard courts, but their draw sizes and tour structures differ.
For current information, the most important details to check are the confirmed player list, draw, session schedule and daily order of play.
Those details change from edition to edition, while the event’s basic structure remains much more stable.
