Iva Jovic breaks into Top 20 on WTA rankings after quarterfinal run at Australian Open

Iva Jovic has continued her meteoric rise up the WTA rankings by breaking into the Top 20 for the first time today, rising from No. 27 to No. 20 after her run to the quarterfinals of the Australian Open.

Following a strong lead-up season, where she reached the semifinals in Auckland and the final in Hobart, the 18-year-old American made it all the way to the first Grand Slam quarterfinal of her career in Melbourne, taking out No. 8-ranked Jasmine Paolini en route for her first Top 10 win before falling to Aryna Sabalenka.

Her 6-3, 6-0 loss to the world No. 1 was much closer than the score would suggest, though—the first set alone lasted 59 minutes, including an 11-minute final game where Jovic had three break points to get back on serve, before Sabalenka finally closed it out.

“I think considering the position that I was in coming into the tournament, obviously I have to be happy with this result,” Jovic said after the match. “It’s hard whenever you lose, so obviously it's not what I wanted today. But yeah, I'm happy overall.”

Ranked No. 172 at this time a year ago, Jovic cracked the Top 100 last June, rising from No. 115 to No. 89 after capturing the first WTA 125K title of her career on the grass of Ilkley, England.

Her biggest jump came in September, when she won the first WTA title of her career the week after the US Open—and at a WTA 500, no less, on the hardcourts of Guadalajara, Mexico. She soared into the Top 50 for the first time afterwards, from No. 73 to No. 36.

The rise continued in the first two weeks of the 2026 season, rising from No. 35 to No. 30 after the semifinal run in Auckland, then from No. 30 to No. 27 after her run to the final in Hobart, and now, after her breakout run in Melbourne, she’s into the Top 20.

She was actually the youngest woman to reach the Australian Open quarterfinals since Nicole Vaidisova in 2007, which was before she was even born, as well as the youngest American woman to reach the last eight there since Venus Williams in 1998.

Jovic is hoping this was just the first of many more deep runs.

“I don’t think it felt that different for me, honestly, because every match is really cool, I think, at this level. It’s really just a dream to even be here,” she said. “Yeah, it’s the quarterfinals, but, you know, ultimately I hope to be in many quarterfinals, right, so I don’t think that this win or loss today is going to make or break my career.”