Sinner has 11,000 points, ahead of Zverev’s 9,720 and Carlos Alcaraz’s 5,560. The 1,280-point lead is misleading because the ratings only count the last 52 weeks, and Sinner is set to lose a lot more than its competitors.
For the rest of the season, Siner would defend nearly 3,050 points: titles in Vienna (500) and Paris Masters (1,000), an unbeaten run in ATP Finals (1,500) and a narrow total from Shanghai (50). Since he won’t be playing again in 2026, those points fall out of his total, with nothing replacing them. Zverev defends only a few hundred points. Alcaraz about 1000.
That leaves Sinner at roughly 7,950 points. Zverev, even if he lost all his remaining matches, would finish around 9140. Alcaraz, at his best, tops 8560.
Alcaraz can’t finish the year at #1
Those numbers do the trick.
Alcaraz can’t finish the year at #1. Even if he had won Shanghai, the indoor tournament, the Paris Masters and the ATP Finals without losing, he would have reached around 8,560 points, still below Zverev’s worst record. The Spaniard plays for number 2 or 3.
And Zverev is now secured in the first place. No one else on the calendar can capture his bottom, so the ranking is mathematically fixed. The 28-year-old German has benefited from injuries to both Sinner and Alcaraz all year, winning the French Open and the US Open, and will become the first German since Boris Becker to finish the season at No.1.
Siner has not played since winning Wimbledon in July. He missed the Canadian Open, pulled out of Cincinnati, pulled out of the US Open and then pulled out of the Asian swing, including the China Open and Shanghai. With his return now pushed to 2027, the points that kept him on top just ran out.
