In tennis, February has a reputation for being full of sound and fury, but not signifying a whole lot.
With no majors or dual-gender 1000s, its 28 days are crammed with more mid-level and low-level events than any other. The players dash from Rotterdam to Rio to Doha to Delray, and stop at many points in between. All of that activity is fun for the diligent fan; there’s tennis on our TVs from morning to night. The downside is that none of the tournaments, on their own, have top-tier prestige. When we look back at the end of the year, the results from this month rarely figure into the story of the season.
Recently, though, February has been the starting point for bigger developments down the road. In 2022, Carlos Alcaraz won his first 500 in Rio, and Iga Swiatek began the 37-match win streak that lifted to her to No. 1. In 2023, Daniil Medvedev began a run that netted him four titles in five events. In 2024, Jasmine Paolini’s meteoric rise to stardom started with her victory in Dubai.
Will we look back at the end of 2025 and see that any bigger developments like those began this month? Here are five possibilities, listed in ascending order of potential importance.
