The Italian Open is an annual professional tennis tournament held in Rome, Italy. It is played on clay courts at the Foro Italico, and is held during the second week of May. The tournament is part of the ATP Masters 1000 events on the ATP Tour and part of the WTA 1000 events on the WTA Tour. The two events were combined in 2011. Rafael Nadal has won the men's singles title a record ten times.

A clay court is one of the types of tennis court on which the sport of tennis is played. Clay courts are built on a foundation of crushed stone, brick, shale, and other aggregate, with a thin layer of fine clay particles on top. Clay courts are more common in Continental Europe and Latin America than in North America, Asia-Pacific or Britain. The only Grand Slam tournament that uses clay courts is the French Open.