Badminton queen An Se-young eyes second world title at fourth championship appearance

An Se-young of Samsung Life, South Korea's top badminton player and the reigning world No. 1, is gearing up to reclaim the world championship title.

South Korea's national badminton team, led by An, departs for New Delhi, India on Friday to begin their medal campaign at the BWF World Championships.

The tournament runs from Monday through Sunday and stands alongside the Summer Olympics as the most prestigious event in badminton.

For An, this marks her fourth appearance at the world championships. In 2023, she became the first Korean player — male or female — to win a singles title at the event.

The championships were not held in 2024 due to the Paris Olympics, and at the most recent edition in 2025, An fell short of the final after losing to Chen Yufei of China in the semifinals, finishing third.

But An has used that setback as fuel to grow stronger.

Last year she matched the all-time single-season wins record with 11 titles, posted the highest career win rate ever recorded for a singles player at 94.8 percent, and surpassed $1 million in career prize money — reaching $1,003,175 — rewriting the record books in the process.

Her form this season has been equally dominant. She swept gold at all seven tournaments she entered, including team events, with the exception of the All England Open Super 1000.

A knee injury forced her to withdraw at the Japan Open last month, briefly halting her winning streak, but analysts say no clear rival is capable of stopping her once she returns to full fitness.

Her head-to-head record backs that up. She has won all five of her most recent meetings against world No. 2 Akane Yamaguchi of Japan, and has gone 12-1 against world No. 3 Wang Zhiyi of China in their last 13 encounters, with the only loss coming at the All England Open.

She has also put to rest the notion that Chen Yufei — who eliminated her at the previous championships — is a nemesis, winning four straight matches against the Chinese player.

An told reporters on July 29 that her condition had improved significantly since she withdrew with injury. "I'm back to training normally," she said. "I'd say I'm about 80 to 90 percent recovered."

In men's doubles, world No. 1 pair Seo Seung-jae and Kim Won-ho are chasing back-to-back world titles.

Like An last year, the pair matched the all-time single-season wins record with 11 titles and capped the year by winning the world championships.

For Seo, a gold medal here would be his third world championship title overall — he previously won in 2023 in Denmark alongside partner Kang Min-hyuk of the Armed Forces Athletic Corps.

However, reversing a recent dip in form is their biggest challenge heading into the event.

In contrast to the dominant run when every tournament entry seemed to end in a title, the pair have failed to win in four consecutive tournaments.

They suffered back-to-back semifinal exits at the Singapore Open and Indonesia Open in June, then lost in the final at both the Japan Open and China Open after a roughly month-long break.

The women's doubles draw also holds strong medal prospects for Korea. The world No. 3 pair of Lee So-hee and Baek Ha-na have shown their quality on big stages this season, claiming silver at the Malaysia Open Super 1000, bronze at the India Open and silver at the All England Open.

The world No. 6 pair of Gong Hee-yong and Kim Hye-jeong, who claimed their first title of the season at the Japan Open last month, will miss the tournament after Gong suffered a knee injury.