Table tennis needs to catch up with tennis in terms of tournament prize money. I don't think there's a massive gap in popularity between the two sports.
Here's what players in each sport earned per round in the Round of 64 (first round main draw) of their biggest tournaments.
Australian Open 2026 (Tennis)
Champion - $4,150,000
Finalist - $2,150,000
Semifinals - $1,250,000
Quarterfinals - $750,000
Round of 16 - $480,000
Round of 32 - $327,750
Round of 64 - $225,000
Source: https://www.atptour.com/en/news/australian-open-2026-prize-money
China Smash 2025 (Table Tennis)
Champion - $135,00
Finalist - $68,000
Semifinals - $34,000
Quarterfinals - $20,250
Round of 16 - $14,000
Round of 32 - $9,000
Round of 64 - $5,000
As you can see, there is almost a 40x difference between prizes between each sport's biggest tournaments.
What do you think should be done so that our beloved sport can catch up in tennis?
Table tennis needs to catch up with tennis in terms of tournament prize money. I don't think there's a massive gap in popularity between the two sports.
Here's what players in each sport earned per round in the Round of 64 (first round main draw) of their biggest tournaments.
Australian Open 2026 (Tennis)
Champion - $4,150,000
Finalist - $2,150,000
Semifinals - $1,250,000
Quarterfinals - $750,000
Round of 16 - $480,000
Round of 32 - $327,750
Round of 64 - $225,000
Source: https://www.atptour.com/en/news/australian-open-2026-prize-money
China Smash 2025 (Table Tennis)
Champion - $135,00
Finalist - $68,000
Semifinals - $34,000
Quarterfinals - $20,250
Round of 16 - $14,000
Round of 32 - $9,000
Round of 64 - $5,000
As you can see, there is almost a 40x difference between prizes between each sport's biggest tournaments.
What do you think should be done so that our beloved sport can catch up in tennis?
Massive difference. I think table tennis is disproportionately popular only in China. Everywhere else in the world, tennis is way more popular—especially in Europe, which has the highest per capita purchasing power globally.
Richer countries mean bigger prizes—if that makes sense.
Table tennis needs to catch up with tennis in terms of tournament prize money. I don't think there's a massive gap in popularity between the two sports.
Here's what players in each sport earned per round in the Round of 64 (first round main draw) of their biggest tournaments.
Australian Open 2026 (Tennis)
Champion - $4,150,000
Finalist - $2,150,000
Semifinals - $1,250,000
Quarterfinals - $750,000
Round of 16 - $480,000
Round of 32 - $327,750
Round of 64 - $225,000
Source: https://www.atptour.com/en/news/australian-open-2026-prize-money
China Smash 2025 (Table Tennis)
Champion - $135,00
Finalist - $68,000
Semifinals - $34,000
Quarterfinals - $20,250
Round of 16 - $14,000
Round of 32 - $9,000
Round of 64 - $5,000
As you can see, there is almost a 40x difference between prizes between each sport's biggest tournaments.
What do you think should be done so that our beloved sport can catch up in tennis?
That's fine. WTT tournaments only started in 2021. The tennis open era started in 1968. So tennis current format has a 50 decades headstart.
Table tennis needs to catch up with tennis in terms of tournament prize money. I don't think there's a massive gap in popularity between the two sports.
Here's what players in each sport earned per round in the Round of 64 (first round main draw) of their biggest tournaments.
Australian Open 2026 (Tennis)
Champion - $4,150,000
Finalist - $2,150,000
Semifinals - $1,250,000
Quarterfinals - $750,000
Round of 16 - $480,000
Round of 32 - $327,750
Round of 64 - $225,000
Source: https://www.atptour.com/en/news/australian-open-2026-prize-money
China Smash 2025 (Table Tennis)
Champion - $135,00
Finalist - $68,000
Semifinals - $34,000
Quarterfinals - $20,250
Round of 16 - $14,000
Round of 32 - $9,000
Round of 64 - $5,000
As you can see, there is almost a 40x difference between prizes between each sport's biggest tournaments.
What do you think should be done so that our beloved sport can catch up in tennis?
Massive difference. I think table tennis is disproportionately popular only in China. Everywhere else in the world, tennis is way more popular—especially in Europe, which has the highest per capita purchasing power globally.
Richer countries mean bigger prizes—if that makes sense.
I agree. I think a good analogy is the prize between pool (billiards) vs snooker. Pool maybe have more wider reach but usually in developing countries like Vietnam and the Philippines but snooker is more popular in European countries. That's why snooker has more prize amount than pool because of the difference in country demographics.
