This was the seventh appearance of the women's singles tennis. A women's event was held only once during the first three Games (only men's tennis was played in 1896 and 1904), but has been held at every Olympics for which there was a tennis tournament since 1908. Tennis was not a medal sport from 1928 to 1984, though there were demonstration events in 1968 and 1984. Germany's
Steffi Graf was the defending Olympic champion (who had achieved the Golden version of the
Grand Slam in 1988) and the #1 seed again in 1992. Two of her top competitors,
Martina Navratilova of the United States and
Monica Seles of Yugoslavia, were ineligible because they had not played in the
Billie Jean King Cup. The #2 seed was home crowd favorite
Arantxa Sánchez Vicario. The United States had the #3 seed and #4 seed in young phenom
Jennifer Capriati and
Mary Joe Fernández. Chile, the People's Republic of China, Latvia, Madagascar, Poland, Romania, South Africa, and Switzerland each made their debut in the event; some former Soviet republics competed as the Unified Team. France and Great Britain each made their sixth appearance, tied for most among nations to that point. ==Competition format==