Wimbledon is the most famous tennis tournament in the world, and for many sports fans attending it sits somewhere near the top of their bucket list. The problem, of course, is actually getting in. The public ballot was introduced in 1924 and has always been substantially oversubscribed and yet two years ago, on our first attempt, The Match Suite entered the ballot and got lucky. Here is everything you need to know about how it works, what your options are, and whether the experience is worth pursuing.
How to get tickets to Wimbledon?
There are broadly four routes into Wimbledon, each with very different levels of certainty, cost, and effort involved.
The public ballot is the most democratic and, in our experience, the most rewarding route. It is a randomised draw run by the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club (AELTC), and it allows anyone to enter for day access tickets to Centre Court and Court Nos. 1, 2 and 3. You cannot choose which day or court you attend, that is decided for you if you are successful. The ballot opens every year in September and closes around mid-September.
The Queue is the famous day-of alternative — camping overnight or arriving very early outside the grounds for one of a limited number of tickets released on the day. Around 500 tickets are reserved per day for Centre Court, Court 1, and Court 2, on sale at the turnstiles. Wristbands are allocated from 7.30am, with the grounds opening at 9.30am. It is a genuine Wimbledon tradition in its own right, but it requires commitment, patience, and ideally a sleeping bag.
The LTA ballot is a separate route available to members of the Lawn Tennis Association. LTA Advantage members at Play+, Compete, or Fan+ tier are eligible to opt in, and the opt-in window runs from late July to the end of August each year. If you play tennis regularly and already have an LTA membership, this is worth exploring as an additional entry point alongside the public ballot.
Official hospitality is the guaranteed but expensive option. Tickets can be purchased through the official hospitality provider Keith Prowse, with packages including premium seating, dining, and guaranteed access on a specific day. It is the choice for those who need certainty: corporate entertaining, a special occasion, or simply not wanting to leave it to chance.
How does the Wimbledon public ballot actually work?
To enter the ballot, you need a myWimbledon account, which can be created on the Wimbledon website. Once registered, you fill out a short ballot form and your entry is in. It genuinely is that simple. Although keep in mind only one application per household is allowed.
The ballot opens for a fortnight every September, and you can apply at any time within that window (it has no bearing on your application whether you enter on day one or day thirteen). There is no advantage to being first through the door. Once the ballot closes, winners are chosen at random and notified from October onwards. If successful, you have 14 days to purchase the pair of tickets you have been allocated.
It is not possible to request tickets for particular days, courts, or seats. Instead, these are assigned entirely by the randomised process. You find out where you are going and when only after you have won. This is either an exciting surprise or a mild frustration depending on your perspective.
In 2025, Wimbledon tickets ranged from £55 for a Court 3 seat in the early days of the tournament to £350 for a Centre Court finals ticket. For 2026, the price range is the same with a slight increase on grounds passes
Our experience: what’s it like going to Wimbledon via the ballot?
Two years ago The Match Suite entered the public ballot for the first time and, somewhat to our surprise, won. We were allocated a pair of Court 1 tickets for the first week of the tournament, which were approximately £80 per person: reasonable by any standard for what turned out to be a genuinely special day.
What struck us the most was the setting and the occasion. Wimbledon is one of those rare sporting venues where the surroundings feel as significant as the sport itself. The grounds are immaculate, the atmosphere is unlike anything we had experienced at a sporting event, and the crowd carries a particular energy: knowledgeable, engaged, and quietly passionate in a very British way. Court 1 itself is an outstanding venue: intimate enough to feel close to the action (even from where we were on the back row) bur large enough to carry real atmosphere.
The food and drink the strawberries and cream, specifically live up to the reputation. Previously priced at £2.50, this year the tournament introduced a 20p increase, bringing the iconic snack to £2.70. Sweet, juicy and picked that very morning, we were lucky to grab the last ones on the shelf!
The ballot process itself was genuinely straightforward. Registration took minutes, the notification arrived clearly, and the purchase process once selected was simple. There were no hidden complications. For a ballot system managing hundreds of thousands of applications, it runs smoothly. You simply show your ticket on your phone at entry, go through some brief bag checks and you’re inside the grounds within minutes.
Is the Wimbledon ballot fair? Our honest review
The ballot is transparent and genuinely randomised. In that sense it is fair. But the reality is that the odds are stacked against any individual applicant in any given year, and there is very little you can do to improve them. You enter, you wait, and either your name comes up or it does not. The LTA ballot gives tennis club members and active players a fair shot- a nod to the sport’s grassroots community .
The secondary market is where the system’s limits become most visible. Resale tickets for popular rounds change hands at multiples of their face value, meaning that those with the budget to buy their way in through unofficial channels will almost always succeed where ballot entrants cannot. Wimbledon has taken steps to reduce touting, but like any major sporting event, it remains a real issue.
The ballot is the right system for a tournament with finite capacity and enormous demand but the All England Club could do more to give regular, unsuccessful applicants some form of priority in future years, as some other major sporting events have done.
Practical tips for entering the Wimbledon ballot
First thing’s first, enter the ballot every year without fail. The odds in any single year are long, but over a decade of entries your chances improve meaningfully. It costs nothing and takes five minutes.
If you are also an LTA member, opt into the LTA ballot separately — the two ballots are independent and you can be successful in both.
If you want to attend in 2026, the ballot has already closed for this year’s tournament, which runs from Monday 29 June to Sunday 12 July 2026. Your options now are the Queue, official hospitality through Keith Prowse, or keeping an eye on the official Wimbledon resale portal, which releases returned tickets closer to the tournament. The ballot for 2027 will open in September 2026 (so set a reminder now).
If you do end up queuing on the day, go early, go prepared, and embrace it. The Queue has its own culture and community, and many regular Wimbledon attendees consider it the most authentic way to experience the tournament.
Is it worth entering the Wimbledon ballot?
Unequivocally, yes. Wimbledon is one of those sporting occasions that lives up to its reputation completely and in The Match Suite’s experience, arriving via the ballot rather than an expensive hospitality package made it feel even more earned. There is something genuinely satisfying about winning your place through a fair draw, paying a reasonable price for your ticket, and spending a day at one of the world’s great sporting venues.
If you have not entered the ballot, start this September. You might be surprised how straightforward the whole thing is and how good it feels when the email arrives telling you that you are in.
thematchsuite.co.uk 
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