Pete Sampras, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer are the only men to have won seven or more singles titles at Wimbledon, but who has the record?
Wimbledon remains the ultimate tennis prize for many players, who know that winning the famous trophy at the All England Club puts them in elite company.
There is an even more select group who have won Wimbledon on multiple occasions and those stars sitting at the top of that list are widely ranked among the greats of the modern era.
Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray are in the group of male tennis players to have won Wimbledon twice, while Boris Becker and John McEnroe are three-time champions.
But there are four players who have bettered that total and they are profiled in our list covering the players with the most men’s singles titles at Wimbledon in the Open Era.
Roger Federer: 8 Wimbledon titles
Federer won Wimbledon on a record eight occasions as part of his illustrious career, giving him the men’s record.
The Swiss great was a winner of 20 grand slam titles and reached 31 major finals as he excelled across all surfaces. But it was the grass courts of Wimbledon with which he was synonymous.
Federer reached 12 Wimbledon finals and won eight of them, including triumphs in seven of his first eight appearances in the showpiece match on Centre Court.
After his first four appearances at the British major, few would have thought they were watching a future all-time great as he suffered three first-round losses, although a 2001 run to the quarter-finals showed his promise before he was eliminated that year by home hope Tim Henman.
But 2003 was the start of a remarkable period of dominance from Federer during the years when he was at the peak of his powers.
His first three successes arrived with a win over Mark Philippoussis in the final and two straight triumphs over American Andy Roddick. Across those three years and 21 match wins, he dropped just four sets.
In 2006, Federer made it four in a row with a win over Nadal and was then pushed all the way by the Spaniard a year later, edging it in five sets to win Wimbledon for a fifth straight year.
It took a herculean effort from Nadal in the 2008 Wimbledon final, a match that many observers labelled the greatest in tennis history, to stop Federer’s streak.
Federer charged back from two sets down by winning two tie-breaks, clinching an epic fourth set 10-8 in the breaker, but then lost 9-7 in a dramatic fifth set after four hours and 48 minutes of captivating action.
It took another Wimbledon classic for Federer to regain the title, winning his sixth crown with his third final win over Roddick on Centre Court, emerging from a gruelling contest as a 16-14 winner in the fifth set.
His run of final appearances came to an end with consecutive quarter-final losses to Czech Tomas Berdych and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, but in 2012 he triumphed over a determined Murray in the final to win a seventh title, with Federer showing his emotion at matching the haul of Pete Sampras, who he described as “my hero”.
An injury-hit season in 2013 included a second-round upset loss to Sergiy Stakhovsky and while Federer rebounded to make the final in the following two years, he was denied on each occasion by Novak Djokovic.
A knee injury hindered him in a last-four defeat to Milos Raonic in 2016 and at 35 it was being debated whether Federer would ever set a new outright record at Wimbledon, something which had seemed inevitable during his prime.
But the veteran did just that in 2017 and achieved it in emphatic fashion. He won the tournament without dropping a set, only the second man to do so at Wimbledon in the Open Era.
He avenged previous losses to Raonic and Berdych en route to seeing off Marin Cilic in the final to become an eight-time champion.
Injuries were again a problem a year later for Federer, who suffered a last-eight loss to Kevin Anderson.
But 2019 will be his biggest Wimbledon regret. Facing Djokovic in a classic final, Federer had two match points to win a ninth title, but could not get over the line. All in all he won just one of his five grand slam finals against Djokovic, and was beaten in all three of the major finals that he had against the Serbian at Wimbledon.
Had Federer won that contest, which lasted almost five hours before being settled by a final-set tie-break, the prospect of Djokovic catching him in the all-time rankings would have been remote.
The cancellation of Wimbledon in 2020 meant it was 2021 when Federer played what proved to be his last match on Centre Court.
Shortly before his 40th birthday, Federer made it to the quarter-finals even though he was clearly short of his fluent best. After a period battling injury, Federer looked rusty after a lack of matches on tour.
And he came unstuck in a humbling straight-sets loss to Hubert Hurkacz in the last eight, the first time he had lost a match 3-0 at Wimbledon since first becoming a champion 18 years before.
While he initially hoped to return to the ATP Tour, Federer ultimately did not play singles again and retired in the knowledge Djokovic was still in with a chance of catching him in the Wimbledon rankings.
His championship total at Wimbledon is one behind that of Martina Navratilova, who won the women’s event nine times to hold the record for most singles titles across male and female players.
Novak Djokovic: 7 Wimbledon titles
With seven titles at the All England club, Djokovic is firmly established as one of the best ever Wimbledon players, and he hopes he can still add further to his championship tally.
Djokovic took a while to warm up at Wimbledon, but once he hit his stride the star from Serbia emerged as a rival that even grass-court great Federer struggled to handle.
In his first six appearances, Djokovic made the last four twice and a quarter-final.
But then he reached four finals in the space of five years, including 2011 when Djokovic won his first Wimbledon crown by defeating Nadal in four sets.
Federer denied him in a semi-final meeting a year later and Djokovic was still stuck on one grass-court major after 2013, when he lost to Murray in front of the Briton’s vociferous home crowd.
That only made Djokovic hungrier, and following that defeat he won a remarkable six Wimbledon titles in just eight attempts, including winning four consecutive events, two either side of the pandemic cancellation in 2020. The Murray match and his epic 2023 defeat to Carlos Alcaraz are the only two Wimbledon finals he has lost.
Two successive battling final wins over Federer, including a five-set triumph in 2014, started the Djokovic-era of Wimbledon dominance.
Losses to Sam Querrey and Berdych in the next two years briefly halted his charge, but a straight-sets win over Anderson in 2018 made him a four-time winner and ended a tough two-year spell without a slam win, a struggle which had come partly due to an elbow injury.
The Wimbledon champion defended his title a year later in that epic 2019 battle against Federer, the longest final in tournament history, somehow saving match points before adding to his major tally.
That famous contest with Federer was followed by him twice coming back from a set down to win finals against Matteo Berrettini (2021) and Nick Kyrgios (2022) as Djokovic continued to cement his status as the man to beat on grass.
But Djokovic was unable to win a fifth straight Wimbledon in 2023, meaning he remains one behind Federer’s record of eight.
The Serbian had a relatively comfortable path to the final and appeared to be on course for glory when he stormed into the lead against Alcaraz, winning the opening set 6-1. But the 20-year-old dug deep to deny his older opponent, winning a close second-set tie-break and then going on triumph in five sets after four hours and 43 minutes to enter the Wimbledon history books with his first title after another classic final involving Djokovic.
Pete Sampras: 7 Wimbledon titles
Sampras is a seven-time Wimbledon champion and his record in finals is unrivalled.
Among the illustrious list of winners, no other player to win three or more titles in the Wimbledon Championships has gone undefeated in showpiece matches.
That makes Sampras’ 7-0 mark in finals even more remarkable.
Sampras had got close in 1992, losing a semi-final to Goran Ivanisevic before embarking on a stunning eight-year run.
He made seven finals, winning all of them, in the space of eight years, losing just once in that span in the 1996 quarter-finals against eventual champion Richard Krajicek.
Fellow American Jim Courier was Sampras’ first victim, before he saw off two of Wimbledon’s best-known figures in Ivanisevic and Becker.
Cedric Pioline was powerless to stop Sampras in 1997 before Ivanisevic was toppled again the following year – the first and only time big-serving Sampras was taken to five sets in a final.
Great rival Andre Agassi was beaten with a masterful performance as Sampras moved on to six successes, before his seventh and last crown was claimed against Australian Pat Rafter, with an injured Sampras battling back from a set and a break down.
Pistol Pete only played in two more Wimbledon events. A 2001 fourth-round defeat to a 19-year-old Federer in the only official match between the pair marked a changing of the guard at the tournament, even though it was Ivanisevic who won that year’s title.
When he played his final major tournament in England a year later – going out in round two in a stunning upset against George Bastl – Sampras must have thought his record of seven titles would be safe for some time.
However, Federer, Djokovic and Nadal proceeded to break almost every record in the sport over the coming decades – and by 2012 the Swiss great had already matched Sampras’ haul, later going on to surpass him.
Bjorn Borg: 5 Wimbledon titles
Borg was the first player to reach five Wimbledon titles and he won all his championships in consecutive years.
The Swede was already a two-time French Open champion when he lost to Arthur Ashe as a teenager in the quarter-finals of Wimbledon in 1975. It would be six years until he was beaten on Centre Court again.
Borg took his first championship in 1976, the 20-year-old not dropping a set throughout the tournament – a feat that was unmatched until Federer did it 31 years later. He surprisingly beat Ilie Nastase in the final to claim glory.
His second title did not come easily, with Borg having to pull off five-set wins over Vitas Gerulaitis and Jimmy Connors to get over the line.
A second win over Connors and a triumph over Roscoe Tanner took Borg to four straight titles.
His fantastic 1980 final against McEnroe is seen by many as the only rival to the 2008 Federer-Nadal thriller in the debate over the best tennis match ever.
Borg emerged triumphant, but only after falling behind and later squandering match points in the fourth set, which his American rival took 18-16 in a breaker. Borg steadied himself to win the deciding set 8-6.
McEnroe got revenge one year later, coming from behind to beat Borg in four sets in what would prove to be the runner-up’s last match at Wimbledon.
It looked at one stage like the classic rivalry had years left to run, but Borg’s shock retirement at the age of 26, following another major final loss to McEnroe (at the US Open) denied him an opportunity to set records that would have been even harder for future generations to match.
Borg is one of the best tennis players to have played both at Wimbledon and Roland Garros, where he won the French Open six times.
Other Multiple Men’s Wimbledon Champions
Federer and Djokovic are the only players to have played in more finals than Boris Becker (7), but the German lost four of his showpiece appearances, meaning he finished up with three crowns.
Becker won his first two in 1985 and 1986, the first as an unseeded 17-year-old.
He had three final battles against Stefan Edberg, losing two, and also suffered losses at the final hurdle against Michael Stich and Sampras.
John McEnroe also ended up with three championships in the Open Era, while Rafael Nadal has had to settle for two after losing to Federer (twice) and Djokovic in finals.
Jimmy Connors was one of the players to beat McEnroe in a final and he ended his career with two Wimbledon crowns, the same total as Andy Murray and Edberg.
Most All-Time Wins
Federer also has the most Wimbledon titles all-time, but William Renshaw features prominently in the list of champions when the amateur era is factored in.
The Briton won seven championships in the Wimbledon men’s singles between 1881 and 1889, while brothers Laurence Doherty (five) and Reginald Doherty (four) were high-profile Wimbledon winners who racked up nine between them.
New Zealander Anthony Wilding is a four-time winner, while two players from Australia also made their marks at Wimbledon.
Rod Laver won four titles, two of which fell In the Open Era, while John Newcombe is one behind on three Wimbledon championships.
Most Men’s Wimbledon Final Appearances
With 12 appearances in the final, Federer is well clear of the pack when it comes to the most trips to the Wimbledon showpiece in men’s tennis.
Djokovic (nine) comes next, closely followed by Becker and Sampras with seven each. Borg and Connors both made it to six finals in Great Britain, with the American losing four of those.
Nadal and McEnroe (both five) are the only other players in the Open Era to make at least five Wimbledon finals.
Most Consecutive Wimbledon Titles and Finals
Federer and Borg share the record for the most consecutive Wimbledon titles at five.
Both players had the chance to make it six in a row, but lost to fierce rivals (Nadal and McEnroe) in the final as they pursued that goal in the sixth year.
Djokovic had won four in a row going into the 2023 tournament, but saw his streak ended by Alcaraz.
Federer stands alone when it comes to reaching the most consecutive Wimbledon finals, reaching seven between 2003 and 2009. Borg (six), McEnroe (five), Becker and Sampras (both four) also had notable runs.
And Djokovic has an active run of reaching five in a row and has only lost once during that streak of consecutive appearances in the final.
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