Carlos Alcaraz's serve
Traced frame by frame from real footage.
Alcaraz reworked his serve before 2025 into a more compact motion with fewer moving parts, and the numbers followed: aces rose from 4.1 to 5.8 a match, and in early 2026 he held 90.8 % of service games. He hit 10 aces and no double faults in the 2025 US Open final.
- 1He sets up side-on with the knees bent and the racquet low, then tosses with the arm reaching straight up.
- 2At the trophy the racquet is cocked behind the head and the knees are deeply bent. In the air the back arches hard as the racquet drops behind him.
- 3Contact is at the top of the jump with the body in one vertical line, before the arm turns over and he lands on the left foot.
Our own observations from the traced frames. Flip through the plate above to check them.
By the numbers
Official serve line, 2025: 64.2 % first serves in, 74.1 % first-serve points won, 56.8 % second, 5.8 aces a match. Early 2026: 68.3 %, 74.3 %, 59.4 %, 6.1 aces, 90.8 % of service games won.
ATP Beyond the Numbers, Feb 2026His coach Juan Carlos Ferrero said they changed the mechanics around December 2024. Watching practice in 2026, the Australian Open's reporter described a more compact action, bending the wrist and elbow instead of reaching fully back.
Tennis.com, Sep 2025; Australian Open, Jan 2026Aces rose from 4.14 a match in 2024 to 5.8 in 2025.
Australian Open, Jan 2026
2025 US Open final
Against Sinner he hit 10 aces and no double faults, won 83 % of first-serve points and finished with a 131 mph service winner. He won 6–2 3–6 6–1 6–4.
Steve Tignor, Tennis.com, Sep 2025What you can copy
Fewer moving parts is the lesson of his change: a more compact action that repeats. No coach has published club advice on his serve, so treat that as the general principle, not a prescription.
Our reading of the reporting on his 2025 change
What we don't claim
- A widely shared claim of 463 aces in 2025 against 265 in 2024 couldn't be verified. We use the per-match figures instead.