The Hong Kong Open is a professional tennis tournament on the Women’s Tennis Association tour. The outdoor hard court event began in 1980 and ran successfully for three editions. It made a brief return in 1993 before being discontinued. The tournament has now been a permanent fixture since 2014 and is a part of the WTA 250 series of events.
A singles and doubles competitions are held at the tournament. The main draw size for the singles is 32 whereas it is 16 for the qualifying draw. Out of 16, six players get to the main draw. Three slots are reserved for wild card entrants. In doubles, the main draw size is of 16.
A best of three sets format is followed for all matches. In singles, all three sets are tiebreak sets. This means that a game score of 6-6 will decide the winner of the set based on a tiebreak wherein the first player to seven points with a difference of two wins the set. A tiebreak is not played if one of the players has won six games with a clear lead of two games. In doubles, the third set is played as a tiebreak where the team that is first to ten points with a difference of two wins.
A title win guarantees 250 ranking points to the singles and doubles winners. The runners-up get 163 points. As of 2024, a total of USD $267,082 is the prize pool for the tournament. The singles champions takes home USD $35,250, and the doubles champion side wins USD $12,820.
Wendy Turnbull won the first two editions of the women’s singles event. The Australian remains the only player to win the singles event twice. In doubles, a similar feat was achieved by America’s Sharon Walsh who was a part of the doubles pair that won the title in 1980 and 1981. The Chinese Taipei team of Chan Hao-Ching and Chan Yung-jan won consecutive titles in 2015 and 2016.
