Australian Open Records: Youngest and oldest champions

The Australian Open first took place in 1905, and some 112 editions later, there have been a number of champions of various ages all the way from 16 to 37. 

Below, we chart the youngest and oldest winners of the men's and women's singles titles.

Youngest men's singles champion

Mats Wilander – 19 years, 3 months

Ken Rosewall can lay claim to being both the youngest and oldest winner of the Australian Open men's singles title, but in the Open Era, it's Mats Wilander who holds the distinction of being the youngest man to lift the Norman Brookes Challenge Cup.

The Swede was no stranger to breaking records – he had already become the youngest French Open champion as a 17-year-old in 1982 – and he doubled his Grand Slam count at 19 with a straight-sets win over Ivan Lendl in the final of the Australian Open at Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club in 1983.

While his French Open record was eclipsed by 1989 champion Michael Chang, his Open-Era Australian Open record is still intact. Wilander would go on to win two more Australian titles, including in the first Melbourne Park edition of the event in 1988 as part of his haul of seven Grand Slams in total.

Oldest men's singles champion

Ken Rosewall – 37 years, 2 months

Australian great Rosewall was just 18 when he captured the first of his four Australian Open titles in the 1953 tournament, beating Mervyn Rose in the final, and he undoubtedly would've won more had he not turned professional in 1957, ruling himself out of Grand Slam competition for over a decade.

Rosewall was still at the top of the game at the dawn of the Open Era and won the first Slam he was able to compete in at the 1968 French Open, defeating fellow Aussie and great rival Rod Laver in the final.

The Sydneysider lost out in the third round in Brisbane on his first Australian Open appearance for 14 years in 1969 but he returned in 1971, this time in his home city, to claim the title. 

He would follow up at the age of 37 in Kooyong the following year, making him the oldest Open Era men's singles champion in any Slam, a record which still stands today but will be in Novak Djokovic's sights come the start of the 2025 tournament.

Youngest women's singles champion

Martina Hingis - 16 years, 3 months

Almost 110 years after Lottie Dod won Wimbledon as a 15-year-old, Martina Hingis delivered on her immense potential by becoming the youngest Open Era women's singles champion, winning the 1997 Australian Open at just 16 years of age.

The Swiss Miss had debuted on the WTA Tour in 1994 at her home Zurich Open, then she tasted Slam success for the first time at Wimbledon in 1996 when, as a 15-year-old, she partnered Helena Sukova to win the women's doubles title.

After runs to the quarter-finals in Melbourne in 1996 and the semi-finals of the US Open the same year, Switzerland's Hingis achieved Grand Slam singles glory in Australia in January 1997, demolishing former champion Mary Pierce 6-2 6-2 in the final without dropping a single set in the tournament.

Injuries contributed to Hingis's retirement from the sport for the first time in 2003 as a five-time Slam singles winner, three of which came at the Australian Open, and while she would compete again, the bulk of her more recent success would come on the doubles court.

Oldest women's singles champion

Serena Williams  – 35 years, 4 months

The 2017 Australian Open will be remembered fondly both for sparking Roger Federer's late-career resurgence and for the women's singles final, in which Serena Williams defeated older sister Venus to claim the last of her 23 Grand Slam singles titles.

Williams first won the Daphne Akhurst Memorial Cup in 2003 by beating Venus and lightning would strike twice 14 years on as she went on to claim the Melbourne Park title for a seventh time with a 6-4 6-4 victory in the siblings' last Grand Slam final clash.

Like Rosewall in the men's game, the American's triumph made her the oldest Open Era Slam winner in women's tennis, a record she still holds.

Williams' 2017 victory was made all the more remarkable when news emerged that she was roughly eight weeks pregnant with her first daughter, Alexis Olympia, when competing in the 2017 final.