Fourteen of the 16 teams who will compete in the 2026 US Open mixed doubles have been confirmed with Carlos Alcaraz and Serena Williams among the latest pairings to be confirmed.

Following the success of the revamped event last year with the event being staged before the singles main draw gets underway, US Open organisers have decided to stick to the winning recipe with $1,000,000 once again on offer for the winning team.

The decision to add star-studded teams like Iga Swiatek-Casper Ruud, Emma Raducanu-Carlos Alcaraz, Jessica Pegula-Jack Draper and Elena Rybakina and Taylor Fritz to the line-up paid off with the tournament getting a lot of attention during Fan Week.

But in the end, doubles specialists Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori prevailed as the Italians successfully defended their title.

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World No 1 Aryna Sabalenka and 24-time Grand Slam winner Novak Djokovic will be a formidable team and they are set to be the top seeds as it is determined by the combined singles rankings.

Pegula-Fritz will form a new team this year as Draper is out injured, while there are doubts over Rybakina as she picked up an injury in the lead-up to the tournament.

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Team Swiatek-Ruud were one of the most exciting partnerships last year and they will look to go one better than 2025 when they finished runner-up, while Belinda Bencic and Flavio Cobolli have formed a new team along with Americans Amanda Anisimova and Learner Tien.

WTA world No 15 Diana Shnaider is also set to feature, but her partner is yet to be confirmed.

Eight Wildcard Teams

Errani and Vavassori will look to make it a third title in a row in New York as they are among the wildcard entrants for the 2026 edition, but there will once again be some exciting partnerships.

Rising Filipina star Alex Eala will team up with world No 4 Felix Auger-Aliassime and the Canadian hopes the Filipina’s fan base will carry them during the tournament.

“It’s a great opportunity because obviously I didn’t play last year, but this time around to kind of feel what it’s like to have the Eala effect and fan base behind me,” Auger-Aliassime said.

“It’s going to be it’s going to be funny because she’s younger than me, but she has a fan base, right? Like she’s carrying the crowd. So, it’s going to be interesting.”

Auger-Aliassime’s compatriot Leylah Fernandez will team up with Frances Tiafoe while there will be an all-American team with Emma Navarro and Tommy Paul pairing up.

Czech pair Jakub Mensik and Karolina Muchova have also received wildcards while husband and wife Elina Svitolina and Gael Monfils will also be in action.

The Taylor Townsend and Alexander Zverev partnership caught most people by surprise and the American told Christian’s Court: “He took me by surprise, actually. He asked me to play after the Gael [& Friends doubles event].

“Originally I kind of iced him because I was planning on playing with Ben. And then Alex went into the locker room and asked Ben, ‘Hey Ben are you playing?’ And Ben was like, ‘No, I’m not playing.’

“So he came back to me and said, ‘[Ben’s] not playing.’ So I said, ‘Alright, let’s play then!'”

But the Alcaraz-Williams team will no doubt get most of the headlines with the latter playing at Flushing Meadows for the first time since 2022 when she lost in the third round of the singles.

Alcaraz, meanwhile, will play in his first event since April as he is making his way back from a serious wrist injury.

Two Spots Up For Grabs

Two more teams will join the line-up and they will be decided via a qualifying competition that will be staged on 24 August.

Eight teams are in the running for those two spots with Katerina Siniakova and Henry Patten, Gabriela Dabrowski and Harri Heliövaara, Luisa Stefani and Neal Skupski, Aleksandra Krunic and Mate Pavic, Kristina Mladenovic and Marcelo Arevalo, and Erin Routliffe and Lloyd Glasspool gaining direct qualifying entries.

Mirra Andreeva and Andrey Rublev, and Peyton Stearns and Christian Harrison have earned wildcard entries into the qualifying event.

The US Open mixed doubles event will be staged on 25-26 August at Flushing Meadows.