Why is Wimbledon also called SW19? All you need to know

The words SW19 have been synonyms with the Wimbledon Championships for years, but few from outside of England know of its significance. It is, in fact, the abbreviated version of the venue’s postal address — South West London.

As the US uses zip codes, England uses unique postal codes to map cities and neighborhoods. And for London, the process began in 1857 when the first postal codes were developed.

The Wimbledon village, which has been hosting the oldest tennis tournament since 1877, was at the time designated the address. The initials SW thus stand for South West London.

As is the case with most systems, an upgrade followed with the aim to improve efficiency. That’s when numbers were added to the alphabetical addresses. This was during World War I and SW became SW19.

That, however, was not the end of it as the ever-evolving postal system demanded for even more specific codes to help deliver mail.

The All England Lawn Tennis Club was then designated the full postal code of SW19 5AE. The, earlier SW19 nomenclature, however, stuck with the public and has since been used interchangeably with the Wimbledon Championships itself.

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Can you use SW19 postal code to reach Wimbledon?

The All England Club has hosted the Wimbledon Championships since its inception in 1877.

While the satellite navigation does use postal codes, the cluster system introduced later in the day means that visitors have to use the full postal code to make their way to the Wimbledon Championships.

In other words, while the SW19 postal address may translate to Wimbledon on paper, navigating requires more numerics.

The full postal address for the All England Club, the venue which has hosted the Wimbledon Championships since its inception, is SW19 5AE. But since the Royal Mail system utilizes the codes to identify clusters or a major landmark in a particular neighborhood, visitors are advised to instead use SW19 5AG or SW19 5AF.

World No. 1s Iga Swiatek and Jannik Sinner were the top seeds at this year’s Wimbledon Championships, but only the latter has managed to secure his spot in the tournament’s second week.

Swiatek, meanwhile, fell by the wayside after being outclassed by a resurgent Yulia Putintseva. She wreaked havoc in the Swiatek service game, taking time away from her opponent with her aggressive intent to sail to a 3-6, 6-1, 6-2 victory.

The Kazakh, who is no stranger to success on grass, had also taken out Naomi Osaka in a similarly stunning upset back in 2019.