The Women's Tennis Association (WTA) is the governing body of the women's professional tennis. It oversees the WTA Tour, which compromises of more than 50 tournaments in almost 30 countries all over the world.
The WTA was founded in 1973 by Billie Jean King, who wanted to offer equal opportunities to women only a few months after the men's governing body was founded. The governing body overseeing the men's circuit is called the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP).
Although King is recognized as the founder of the WTA, there were multiple women involved in the process. The original group of players standing behind the WTA is called the Original 9, and except for King it includes also Rosie Casals, Nancy Richey, Kerry Melville, Peaches Bartkowicz, Kristy Pigeon, Judy Dalton, Valerie Ziegenfuss, and Julie Heldman.
More than 50 years later, the WTA is still overseeing the women's professional circuit, and after undergoing multiple changes, the tournaments are divided into categories that align with the ATP, such as the WTA Finals, WTA 1000, WTA 500, and WTA 250. Previously the tournaments had names such as "Premier Mandatory", "Premier Five", and "International".
Each week since November 3, 1975, the WTA also publishes WTA Rankings, which rank players based on accumulated points over the past 52 weeks. More than 25 players reached the world no. 1 spot in their career, but only a few legends have dominated for over 100 weeks.
Steffi Graf held a record for most weeks spent as the world no. 1 (377) for both Tours until Novak Djokovic broke her record in 2023. Now, the German holds the record for most weeks spent as the world no. 1 on the WTA Tour.
Currently, the WTA also has a Players' Council, which should represent players' interests in front of the WTA, consisting of players of various rankings on the WTA Tour.
However, in 2019, Novak Djokovic launched the Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA) in an attempt to give players even more representation, and multiple WTA players joined it, such as Ons Jabeur, Paula Badosa, and Bethanie Mattek-Sands.
