Rybakina, Pegula, Svitolina, Swiatek headline Tokyo field

World No. 1 Elena Rybakina will be the top seed at next month's Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo, the final 500-level tournament of the WTA Tour Driven by Mercedes-Benz season.

She'll be joined by fellow Top 10 players Jessica Pegula, Elina Svitolina, Iga Swiatek and Marta Kostyuk.

As the last WTA 500 of the season, the Toray Pan Pacific Open will potentially carry significant WTA Finals implications. 

Svitolina and Karolina Muchova are currently six and seventh, respectively, on the PIF Race to the WTA Finals leaderboard. Linda Noskova is eighth, though because she has won a Grand Slam this season, she'd have to finish below No. 20 on the leaderboard not to qualify.

Kostyuk and Swiatek are ninth and 10th, respectively, on the leaderboard as the second-to-last WTA 1000 in Beijing is getting underway.

1 -	Elena Rybakina KAZ Qualified Q	7,492
2 -	Aryna Sabalenka BLR Qualified Q	6,485
3 -	Jessica Pegula USA	5,825
4 1	Mirra Andreeva RUS	5,722
5 -1	Coco Gauff USA	5,654
6 -	Elina Svitolina UKR	4,809
7 -	Karolina Muchova CZE	4,400
8 -	Linda Noskova CZE	4,234

View Race Rankings

1 -	Taylor Townsend Qualified Katerina Siniakova Qualified	8,370
2 -	Gabriela Dabrowski Qualified Luisa Stefani Qualified	6,743
3 -	Aleksandra Krunic Anna Danilina	5,638
4 -	Kristina Mladenovic Hanyu Guo	3,566
5 -	Demi Schuurs Ellen Perez	3,035
6 -	Shuai Zhang Elise Mertens	3,018
7 -	Nicole Melichar-Martinez Cristina Bucsa	2,917
8 -	Su-Wei Hsieh Jelena Ostapenko	2,898

View Race Rankings

The Tokyo field will also include Top 20 players Belinda Bencic, Iva Jovic, Diana Shnaider, Sorana Cirstea (in what could potentially be the final tournament of her career), Naomi Osaka, Alexandra Eala, Elise Mertens and Jasmine Paolini.

The final four direct entrants are Maja Chwalinska, Anna Kalinskaya, Leylah Fernandez and Ekaterina Alexandrova.

The first four main-draw alternates are Ann Li, Diane Parry, Maria Sakkari and Nikola Bartunkova.

In addition to the 17 direct entrants, the 28-player field includes six qualifiers, four wild cards and a special exempt spot. The top four seeds will receive byes into the second round.

Bencic is the defending champion in Tokyo. She defeated Varvara Gracheva, Muchova and Sofia Kenin in her first three matches before beating Noskova in the final. This will be her seventh time playing the Toray Pan Pacific Open. She made her debut here in 2013, and reached the final two years later, falling to Agnieszka Radwanska. 

Osaka is also a former champion in Tokyo, winning this tournament back in 2019. She also made finals here in 2016 and 2018.

Rybakina, who is also playing for the year-end No. 1 ranking, won two matches here last year before pulling out of the semifinals with back pain.

First-round action in Tokyo will begin on Monday, Oct. 26, and the tournament will run through Sunday, Nov. 1, when both the singles and doubles finals will be played. 

In addition to 500 ranking points, the Tokyo champion will earn $185,500.