Qiddiya Investment Company has unveiled plans for a 33,000-seat Saudi Arabia tennis centre in the desert, built to mirror the look of Wimbledon from the green and purple courts and the plant-covered facades to the retractable roof on the flagship arena. Renderings released this week show the All England Club’s signature colour scheme, a 15,000-seat Centre Court, and exterior walls woven with greenery, all drawn by Populous, the same firm behind the retractable roof on Wimbledon’s best-known court. The complex sits 45 km west of Riyadh inside Qiddiya City, a new entertainment, sport, and culture hub.
None of the 30 courts will be grass. Twenty-eight will be hard and two will be clay. The retractable roof on the 15,000-seat Centre Court is for climate control in the Saudi heat, not for rain in south-west London. Construction is already underway, and the National reports the venue could be operational as soon as 2027, in time for an ATP Masters 1000 tournament Saudi Arabia is set to host from 2028.
A Centre Court, Rebuilt in the Desert
Qiddiya Investment Company announced the National Tennis Centre on Monday, calling it Saudi Arabia’s ‘future home of international tennis’. The 15,000-seat Centre Court, the plant-covered exterior walls, the green and purple courts, and the lead architect Populous, all mirror the home of Wimbledon.
The flagship arena’s retractable roof is for climate control in a country where summer temperatures run high, the visual mimicry of the All England Club has framed the new design as a near-copy of SW19. The complex has 30 courts in total. None of them are grass. Twenty-eight will be hard courts and two will be clay. The plant-covered facades on the exteriors of the buildings are designed to integrate the venue into the surrounding Tuwaiq Mountains, a Qiddiya Investment Company design touch that aims to soften the look of a hard-court venue on a desert site.
The centre has the necessary capabilities to host major tournaments and elite players, having been built according to the highest international specifications and standards.
Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al-Faisal is Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Sport and President of the Saudi Olympic and Paralympic Committee. He spoke in the Qiddiya Investment Company announcement on Monday.
| Venue | Capacity | Surface / Use |
|---|---|---|
| Centre Court | 15,000 seats | Retractable roof, flagship arena, comparable in scale to leading international tennis venues |
| Court 1 | 5,000 seats | Match court |
| Court 2 | 2,000 seats | Match court |
| Court 3 (Arena) | 8,000 seats | Multi-use arena for sport, concerts, and major events, with retractable roof |
| Outdoor match courts | 450 seats each | Per court |
| Total | 33,000 | Across the 30-court site |
What the Qiddiya Site Adds Up To
Construction is well underway at the Qiddiya site, according to the architect’s full announcement on the project. The 30-court, 33,000-seat complex will sit at the lower plateau of a city planned to be three times the size of Paris, with a public Fan Plaza and a media centre built to host international press delegations.
Six of the courts are competition or match courts, with outdoor seating of 450 each. Six are indoor courts. Fourteen are practice courts, some of them on clay. The 15,000-seat Centre Court and the 8,000-seat Court 3 arena both carry retractable roofs and are designed to host concerts and other events when tennis is not in play. A High Performance Training Centre, with a state-of-the-art gym, hydrotherapy and physiotherapy suites, athlete recovery and wellness spaces, and dedicated changing facilities, sits alongside the courts.
Qiddiya City is already partly open. The Six Flags theme park and Aquarabia, billed as the Middle East’s largest water park, have welcomed visitors. PlayMaker Studios, a new purpose-built film production hub, is operating. A Sir Nick Faldo signature 18-hole championship golf course opens later this year, and the Prince Mohammed bin Salman Stadium, a 2034 World Cup venue, is already under construction. The master plan, anchored to what Qiddiya Investment Company calls the ‘Power of Play’ philosophy, will also include homes, retail, offices, hotels, schools, and hospitals, linked by a planned high-speed rail to King Abdullah Financial District in 17 minutes.
- Speed Park Track
- The Qiddiya City Horse Racing Venue
- The Gaming and Esports District
- The Qiddiya Performing Arts Centre
The Timeline and the Tournament on the Calendar
The National reports the venue could be operational as soon as 2027. No official confirmation has named Qiddiya as the host of the next ATP Masters 1000. The Saudi Tennis Federation has, in public, said the centre helps guide players from amateur to professional ranks, tying the project to the sports objectives of Saudi Vision 2030.
The Masters 1000 deal itself was struck in October 2025, when PIF’s Surj Sports Investment and the ATP announced the launch of the tenth Masters 1000 tournament, in what the tour called its first-ever expansion of the category. The new event joins the existing nine at Indian Wells, Miami, Monte-Carlo, Madrid, Rome, Toronto or Montreal, Cincinnati, Shanghai, and Paris. ATP Chairman Andrea Gaudenzi called it ‘a proud moment for us’. It begins as early as 2028.
Riyadh has hosted the WTA Finals since 2024, when the season-ending women’s event moved to Saudi Arabia for the first time. Jeddah has hosted the Next Gen ATP Finals since 2023, the men’s under-21 season-ender. The National reports the Saudi Tennis Federation has decided not to renew its contract with the WTA after November’s tournament, ending a three-year run that drew a public backlash led by Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert, with critics publicly raising the kingdom’s record on women’s rights. PIF is the official naming partner of both the PIF ATP Rankings and the PIF WTA Rankings, giving the fund naming rights across both tours.
The new venue has no grass courts, ruling out the calendar’s grass-court events. The 15,000-seat Centre Court and 8,000-seat Court 3 arena are the two multi-use venues, each with a retractable roof for climate control and non-tennis programming. The Qiddiya site also includes community tennis programmes, open public spaces, fan zones, a Fan Plaza, and cultural activations, all designed to make the venue a daily part of Qiddiya City’s life.
The National Tennis Centre at Qiddiya City is a remarkable addition to the global tennis landscape. As the largest tennis facility of its kind in the region, it reflects a bold vision for the future of tennis and a commitment to creating more opportunities for people to engage with our sport, whether as players, fans or members of the wider community.
Eno Polo is the chief executive of the ATP. He spoke in the Qiddiya Investment Company announcement on Monday.
The Lines Behind the Centre Court
The Qiddiya announcement is the latest piece of a multi-year PIF push into tennis. PIF struck a multi-year strategic partnership with the ATP in 2024, becoming the official naming partner of the PIF ATP Rankings, and a parallel deal with the WTA the same year, extending the naming rights to the WTA rankings. The October 2025 Masters 1000 agreement is built on that partnership, with Surj Sports Investment, a PIF subsidiary, named as the partner. PIF also sponsors Queen’s Club, the Wimbledon warm-up event where the Qiddiya announcement landed, a deal that came after an about-turn by British tennis chiefs, the Telegraph reports. A reported PIF bid to unify the ATP and WTA tours would, if it lands, add a third piece to the PIF tennis portfolio, on top of the rankings naming rights and the Masters 1000 deal.
Turki Alalshikh, chairman of Saudi’s General Entertainment Authority, created the Six Kings Slam, an annual men’s exhibition in Riyadh, with a $6m (£4.7m) winner’s prize and a $13.5m total purse. Jannik Sinner beat Carlos Alcaraz in the first two finals. Andy Murray, a three-time Grand Slam champion, has called the exhibition ‘an exhibition nobody cares about’, capturing a strand of player scepticism that the Qiddiya announcement did not address on Monday.
The Pattern from LIV Golf and The Line
The tennis push is not the only PIF sports wager to face a public delivery date. The Telegraph reported on Monday that the Qiddiya announcement came weeks after PIF pulled the plug on its multibillion-dollar investment in LIV Golf, a Saudi-funded rival league PIF had backed since 2022. The Saudi tennis investments PIF had already bankrolled, including the rankings naming rights and the Masters 1000 deal, remained on the books when the Qiddiya venue was announced on Monday. Saudi officials have framed the Qiddiya venue as a permanent international facility, and the Qiddiya Investment Company’s announcement makes no reference to LIV Golf.
The Line, the 170-km linear city that was Neom’s centrepiece, has been scaled back. Semafor reported in May 2026 that Saudi Arabia had delayed construction of The Line until at least after 2030. A Wikipedia entry summarising international media reports, including the Financial Times, says no construction work was taking place at the end of 2025 and that the project was described as a ‘likely failure’. The original plan, per Wikipedia, called for 170 km of mirrored skyscrapers housing up to 9 million people. Qiddiya is a separate project from Neom, but it sits inside the same Vision 2030 portfolio of giga-projects the kingdom is delivering in stages.
Saudi officials frame the National Tennis Centre as a permanent international venue, with construction well underway and a clear runway to a 2027 opening. The Saudi Tennis Federation has, in public, said the project supports the kingdom’s wider sports strategy under Vision 2030. Whether the same PIF commitment that built, then scaled back, then walked away from LIV Golf will still be writing cheques to Qiddiya in 2030 is a question the announcement does not address. The Qiddiya venue is not a private rival league, but the underlying source of money is the same PIF.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Saudi Arabia’s new tennis centre?
The National Tennis Centre sits at the lower plateau of Qiddiya City, 45 km west of Riyadh, in the Tuwaiq Mountains. The Qiddiya Investment Company is the developer; the city is being built as Saudi Arabia’s capital of entertainment, sport, and culture, with a planned footprint three times the size of Paris.
How many courts and seats does it have?
The complex holds 30 courts in total: 28 hard courts and two clay courts. Seating adds up to 33,000 across the site, with the 15,000-seat Centre Court and the 8,000-seat Court 3 arena both built with retractable roofs.
When will it open?
The National reports the venue could be operational as soon as 2027, though Qiddiya Investment Company has not confirmed an opening date and construction remains underway.
Will the new ATP Masters 1000 be held there?
Not officially. The Masters 1000 tournament Saudi Arabia is set to host begins in 2028, with the venue still to be confirmed. The National reports Qiddiya is the expected host, but neither the ATP nor the Saudi Tennis Federation has confirmed the site.
Are any of the courts grass?
No. All 30 courts are hard or clay. The renderings and the architect’s announcement both confirm the breakdown as 28 hard courts and two clay courts, with no grass surface anywhere on the site.
