26 amazing things Carlos Alcaraz achieved by winning the '26 Australian Open

Carlos Alcaraz won his first Australian Open in style this year, storming past his first five opponents in straight sets, battling back from the brink of defeat—and overcoming cramps—to edge Alexander Zverev in a semifinal epic, and finally rallying from a set down to defeat Novak Djokovic for the title.

And with that run, he achieved a lot—here are just 26 of the things he did by winning the ’26 Australian Open:

Having already won Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open previously, he completed the Career Grand Slam. And given he’s won the other three twice each, he’s now one Australian Open title away from a Double Career Slam!

He’s the ninth man in tennis history to complete the Career Slam. Fred Perry, Don Budge and Roy Emerson did it before the Open Era, Rod Laver did it before and during the Open Era, and Andre Agassi, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and now Alcaraz have done it in the Open Era too.

And it gets even more historic—he’s actually the youngest man ever to complete the Career Slam. At 22 years and 8 months, he clears the previous record, held by Budge, by a few months. The American legend completed his set at Roland Garros in 1938 at 22 years and 11 months.

Interestingly, he’s the first man ever to complete his Career Slam at the Australian Open. Of the previous eight men who did it, the most common final piece was Roland Garros (Perry, Budge, Agassi, Federer and Djokovic). One did it at Wimbledon (Emerson) and two at the US Open (Laver and Nadal).

He won his seventh Grand Slam title. He’s now won one Australian Open (2026), two Roland Garroses (2024, 2025), two Wimbledons (2023, 2024) and two US Opens (2022, 2025).

He’s now won seven of the 20 Grand Slams he’s played so far in his career. That’s more than a third of them!

And it gets even better—not only has he won seven of the last 14 Grand Slams, he's won seven of the last 13 Grand Slams he's played. Those stretches both date back to the 2022 US Open. He missed the 2023 Australian Open with a leg injury.

He’s actually the youngest man ever to win seven Grand Slam titles. The previous record belonged to Bjorn Borg, who won his seventh major title at 1979 Roland Garros at age 23.

He’s now 7-1 in his career in Grand Slam finals, his only loss coming to Jannik Sinner in last year’s Wimbledon final.

He’s the first player ever to beat Djokovic in an Australian Open final. The 10-time champion in Melbourne was also a flawless 10-0 in finals in Melbourne, and after a flawless first set it looked like he might improve that to 11-0, before Alcaraz bounced back to prevail in four sets, 2-6, 6-2, 6-3, 7-5.

Having also won their two Wimbledon finals, he’s the first player ever to win their first three Grand Slam finals against Djokovic. Only one other player even won their first two against the G.O.A.T., and it wasn’t Federer or Nadal—it was Stan Wawrinka, at 2015 Roland Garros and the 2016 US Open.

Since the Australian Open switched to hard courts in 1988, he’s just the sixth man to win back-to-back hard-court majors at the US Open and Australian Open. The first five men to do it were Pete Sampras (twice), Agassi (twice), Federer (twice), Djokovic (three times) and Sinner (once).

He’s the second Spanish player ever to win the Australian Open. Nadal is the only other Spanish player, male or female, to win in Melbourne, doing it twice in 2009 and 2022.

He now has an 87.5% career winning percentage at Grand Slams (91-13). He’s already passed Federer (86.0%) and he’s inching closer to Nadal (87.7%) and Djokovic (87.8%).

He’s now won titles on five different continents. Of his now-25 career titles, 14 have come in Europe, six in North America, two in South America, two in Asia and now one in Australia.

He’s now 9-1 against Top 5 players at Grand Slams over the last two years, his only loss in that time span coming to then-world No. 1 Sinner in last year’s Wimbledon final.

It was the milestone 10th hard-court title of his career. He also has 11 career titles on clay and four on grass.

He’s now on a 14-match winning streak at Grand Slams, the second-longest Grand Slam winning streak of his career after he won 15 in a row at the majors in 2024, which brought him titles at Roland Garros at Wimbledon before he fell in the second round of the US Open to Botic van de Zandschulp.

After his grueling 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-7 (3), 6-7 (4), 7-5 semifinal victory over Alexander Zverev last Friday, he’s now 15-1 in his career in five-setters. His only career five-set loss came to Matteo Berrettini in the third round of the 2022 Australian Open—he’s won his last 12 in a row since then.

He won the 25th title of his career. He breaks a three-way tie with Sinner (24) and Zverev (24) and now has the second-most career titles among active men, after Djokovic (101).

He now has 55 career wins over Top 10 players, after victories over No. 6 Alex de Minaur in the quarters (53rd), No. 3 Zverev in the semis (54th) and No. 4 Djokovic in the final (55th).

He’s now won 63 of his last 68 matches on the tour, a run that dates back to the start of last April. Of the 12 tournaments he’s played since then, he’s won eight titles and reached another three finals—his only pre-final loss came to Cam Norrie in his opening match at the Masters 1000 event in Paris last fall.

He continues the “Sincaraz” winning streak at Grand Slams. Alcaraz and Sinner have now won the last nine majors in a row between them, tied for second-longest streak by a pair of men in the Open Era with Nadal and Djokovic’s nine in a row between 2010 Roland Garros and 2012 Roland Garros. The longest streak was Federer and Nadal’s 11 in a row between Roland Garros in 2005 and the US Open in 2007.

Also, when Alcaraz and Sinner are both in the draw, one of them has gone on to win the last 16 tournaments they’ve played. The last time someone else won an event where they were both in the draw was Andrey Rublev at Madrid… in 2024!

He surpasses 13,000 ranking points for the first time. He cracked 10,000 and 11,000 for the first time after winning last year’s US Open, 12,000 for the first time after reaching the final of the ATP Finals at the end of last year, and he now shatters the 13,000-point barrier, going from 12,050 to 13,650.

And finally, he now has a 3,350-point lead at No. 1. That’s by far the biggest points lead he’s ever had at the top spot, shattering his previous-biggest lead of 1,340 points.