Venus Williams has confirmed she's engaged to marry Andrea Preti

In an interview conducted after her first singles match in more than a year on Tuesday (22.07.25), former player Rennae Stubbs asked Venus whether being in a happy relationship has made a difference to her performance and the tennis ace replied: "My fiance is here and he really encouraged me to keep playing.

"There were so many times where I just wanted to coast and kind of chill. Do you know how hard it is to play tennis? You guys don't know how much work goes into this, like it's nine to five except you're running the whole time.

"Lifting weights and just like dying and then you repeat it the next day. So he encouraged me to get through this and it's wonderful to be here. He's never seen me play."

In an interview conducted before she became involved with Preti, Venus previously admitted she was in no rush to settle down even though her friends were urging her to focus on finding love.

She told Cosmopolitan magazine in 2021: "I have a lot of friends who don't believe me when I say that I like my life and I don't want to change it for any reason. I'm not desperate and they don't believe me.

"They say things like: 'You're going to miss your window'. I'm like: 'Please, relax. You might feel this way, but I don't. I promise you I don't'."

She later opened up about her single status in a chat with Glamour magazine in 2022, insisting she found it difficult to "get out" of single life.

Venus explained: "I've had a single life for a long time and I think it's really easy to get stuck in a single life and sometimes - at least for me - harder to get out.

"It makes you think about yourself and what you want and how to behave ... When life changes, you've got to know when to change," Williams explained. "You can't hold on to either a relationship or the singleness."