Wimbledon

You need to register for the public ballot at Wimbledon.com. The number of tickets available seems likely to be reduced, as those that had tickets for last year will be given priority for 2022. If you are unsuccessful in the ballot, there’s always queuing on the day in the time honoured fashion.

In 2018, I chose to purchase debenture tickets through Sporting Agenda. I believe they are now called Wimbledon Debenture Tickets. There are a few agencies who sell debenture tickets. This was an expensive way to go, but I had only one day available to attend, and I wanted to guarantee that I would see tennis action. I had entered the international draw but did not get lucky. I purchased Centre Court tickets. They sold either Court 1 or Centre Court tickets. I requested seats in the shade, and they were perfect. The agency delivered the tickets to our London hotel the day before we arrived. There are other ways to obtain tickets (including grounds admission) at a much cheaper cost. It kind of depends on whether or not you want a seat at one of the show courts.

Debenture tickets are eye wateringly expensive, particularly if rain interrupts play. I have found the most fun at Wimbledon is to go in the first week and explore the grounds and the outside courts. I got to see Martina Navratilova years ago playing a seniors match on an outside court - I had tickets for Number One court.

Gosh, tickets in advance is a difficult proposition. If you can get them, great. If not, I got in via the queue and can recommend that as an interesting way to see Wimbledon.

You have to start early. I got to the queue by 8:00 am. Take taxi, or tube to Southfields and bus to Woodspring Road. Walk into the park and find the end of the queue. You'll get a ticket showing your place in the queue.

You have to be in the first 500, I think, to get tickets to one of the show courts. I didn't, so I got a grounds pass which gets you into any of the non-show courts. I went to Court #2 and saw the Mens Round of 16 (Tsonga). Then I watched some juniors, then went to Court #18 and watched the seniors (Navratilova).

Then the fun began. There is a ticket resale booth where they sell discounted tickets to Centre Court to replace people who leave early. On my day, Serena played the first match, then everyone left and there were a bunch of tickets to be had. So I spent the rest of the day in Centre Court watching the Women's Quarters (Kerber, Azarenka, Radwanska).

Between matches there was the stereotypical strawberries and cream and Pimms cups. Enjoyed talking to the fans around me and basically had an awesome day!

Jennifer, that's exactly why one would purchase Centre Court or Court 1 tickets--if it rains, those two show courts have a roof and you will still see tennis. If you have only a grounds pass, and it rains all day, you won't see any tennis.
OP, if you queue you need to get there very early (People used to sleep overnight! Not sure if that was allowed this year.) and you may not be far enough ahead in the line to secure a show court ticket. If you only want a grounds pass and you have a couple of different days you could go, then try the queue. If not, enter the international ballot. If you don't draw tickets, consider purchasing debenture tickets if it is within your budget.

Wimbledon under the roof doesn’t feel like Wimbledon!

we timed our 2018 Wimbledon trip to be there for July 4th, did the queue, dressed in all things Americana and were richly rewarded with a phenomenal experience. Take a deep dive into learning how to enjoy all things Wimbledon with on line research and signing up for updates. We are HUGE professional tennis groupies and Wimbledon transcended all our prior experiences. Some thoughts............
If you are rich then do purchase tickets for center court. We ain't so arrived for the queue at 4:30 a.m. and enjoyed every moment of the well organized experience. This action became a foundation for enjoying the remainder of the day.
We received general admission grounds tickets and watched a lot of great tennis.
Being dressed for July 4th brought engagement form a lot of fans and even a couple of players, John Isner, which elevated the experience.
We did purchase "resell tickets" and sat six rows off of center court! Just the experience of sitting in center court elevated our memories for the day.
The Wimbledon staff is great and strived to help guide everyone to maximizing their enjoyment of the day.
We have been to a number of major tennis tournaments and found food/drink pricing to be reasonable, especially in comparison to the US Open and French open.
Due to the early arrival we took a private taxi to the event and then the tube at the end of the day.
For the final match we did encounter a rain delay, but it only added to the overall experience.

Does it have to be Wimbledon? We have found the ticket acquisition process so daunting we have not even tried. But we have been to the other three Grand Slam tournaments, as well as Indian Wells. The Australian Open, for sheer fun and overall experience, by far our favorite, but perhaps not good timing for a teen who is still in school at the end of January.

Would the French Open timing work? It was very easy to purchase grounds passes for that. And then, by sheer coincidence, we were there for the day a young friend of our was to play Stan Warwrinka, and we got to sit with the family in our friend's players' box to watch.

The one criticism we had of the Roland Garros venue was the long and cumbersome security check at entry (it was fairly chaotic and took over an hour for the day we did not have the VIP passes). But it may be like that at Wimbledon as well. And I believe Roland Garros has been remodeled since then (2016) so maybe they have resolved the access problem.

This year it was so much easier to visit Wimbledon if you wanted: tickets all online and although the first tranche had quite an (electronic) queue at least in part from teething troubles later ones were not so difficult even for the singles finals, at least from some friends' experiences..

Next year if it presumably reverts to having to queue in person etc, and all the balloting it will be more awkward, plus the greater demand. Even then, some tickets have been available in past years released on the day before online.

Going to Wimbledon (in 2017) was one of my all time favorite travel experiences. We queued and had an amazing day. I would have been happy with grounds passes but we were thrilled to get court 1 tickets.

I posted a trip report if you’d like to read more about our experience:
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/our-wimbledon-experience-7-7-17