Endorsements

Osaka is one of the most marketable athletes in the world. She earned an
estimated $16 million in endorsements alone in 2019, which placed her second
among all female athletes behind only Serena Williams who earned $25 million.
[115]
 The following year, she became the highest-paid female athlete of all time,
having earned $37.4 million in total, including $34 million in endorsements.[116]
[117]
 Overall, she was the 29th highest-paid athlete in 2020 and the 8th highest-paid
athlete in endorsements alone.[118]
Nike has been Osaka's apparel sponsor since 2019, [119] having replaced Adidas who
had sponsored her for four years. [120] With Nike, Osaka has a clothing collection
featuring her monogram logo that uses her initials and is inspired by the Japanese
flag.[121][122] The Japanese sporting equipment manufacturer Yonex has supplied her
with rackets since 2008.[123] She plays with the Yonex Ezone 98 racket, equipped
with Polytour Pro 125 and Rexis 130 strings. [124] Osaka has been represented by
the IMG management company since 2016.[125]
Osaka is a brand ambassador for Japanese automobile manufacturer Nissan and
Japanese electronics manufacturer Citizen Watch.[123][126] She also endorses several
other Japanese companies, including noodle maker Nissin Foods, cosmetics
producer Shiseido, the broadcasting station Wowow, and airline All Nippon
Airways (ANA).[127][128][129]
In January 2021, Osaka was named the brand ambassador for Tag Heuer watches
as well as Louis Vuitton and she will appear in their Spring-Summer 2021
campaign.[130]

Personal life
Osaka had a shy, reserved personality in her early years on the WTA Tour. [131] Her
former coach Sascha Bajin was initially confused by her personality, saying, "I
thought she was a little bit more of a diva because she didn't talk much. She
doesn't really look at someone's eyes, but that's just because she was always so
shy ... Back then I didn't know for what reason." [106] Osaka is also very frank and is
regarded as having a dry sense of humor. During her 2018 Indian Wells Open
victory speech, she began by saying "Um, hello ... I'm Naom ... oh never mind" and
later noted, "This is probably going to be the worst acceptance speech of all time"
after being worried about forgetting whom to thank, and appearing to nearly forget
to thank her opponent Daria Kasatkina as well as one of her sponsors Yonex.[132][133]
Osaka has since made efforts to overcome her shyness, [134] while also becoming a
leading activist in professional tennis. Her decision to withdraw from the 2020
Cincinnati Open in New York to raise awareness for the police shooting of Jacob
Blake led the tournament to postpone all ATP and WTA matches for a day in
support of her cause.[90] At the 2020 US Open beginning the following week, the
masks she wore as she walked onto the court due to the COVID-19 pandemic each
prominently displayed the name of an African American who had been killed in the
preceding few years, the majority of whom in the year before the tournament and
the majority of whom by police. She highlighted Breonna Taylor, Elijah
McClain, Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, George Floyd, Philando Castile,
and Tamir Rice; and was praised directly by the parents of Martin and Arbery. [91]
[135]
 Prior to these acts of activism, Osaka had also travelled to Minnesota to attend
the protests of the police killing of George Floyd. She outlined her personal reasons
for supporting the Black Lives Matter movement and protesting police brutality in an
op-ed in Esquire magazine.[136]
Osaka was named a 2020 Sports Illustrated Sportsperson of the Year for her
activism alongside the year's other prominent activist sports champions LeBron
James, Breanna Stewart, and Patrick Mahomes, as well as medical worker Laurent
Duvernay-Tardif.[137] She was also honored as one of the Time 100 most influential
people in the world in 2020 for her activism, having also been named to the list in
2019 for representing professional tennis well as an excellent role model and a
major champion.[138][139]
Osaka has been featured as the main character in a manga series published
by Kodansha in Nakayoshi, a leading Japanese shojo magazine. The series is
being drawn by Futago Kamikita and was made with the help of Osaka's sister
Mari. The first edition appeared in the February 2021 issue of the magazine, which
was released in December 2020.[140][141]
Osaka is in a relationship with American rapper Cordae.[142][143]
In 2021, Osaka became a co-owner of the North Carolina Courage in the National
Women's Soccer League, the top level of the women's sport in the U.S.[144][145]
Background
Osaka has said, "My dad's Haitian, so I grew up in a Haitian household in New
York. I lived with my grandma. And my mom's Japanese and I grew up with the
Japanese culture too, and if you're saying American, I guess because I lived in
America, I also have that too." [3] Her Haitian grandparents only spoke to her
in Creole because they did not know English, while her mother conversed with her
in Japanese.[2] Osaka elected for Japanese citizenship over American in 2019, with
an eye on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. She said, "I always represent Japan when I
play."[146] Osaka can understand Japanese, but is not very confident speaking the
language. She has said, "I can understand way more Japanese than I can
speak."[147] At press conferences, Osaka can take questions in Japanese but
typically will answer them in English.[148][149]
Osaka's background is particularly unusual given that she represents Japan, a
country that perceives itself as being very racially homogeneous. In Japan, she is
referred to as a hāfu, meaning that she is half-Japanese. [147] Her Japanese
grandparents did not initially accept her parents' relationship. This led to her
parents relocating from Hokkaido to the city of Osaka, where she and her sister
were born. As a result, her mother had no contact with her family for nearly
15 years and Osaka did not get the chance to return to Japan until she was 11
years old, nor did her grandparents initially support her parents for building their
daughters' lives around tennis.[2] However, they later began to support Osaka as a
tennis player following her unexpected upset of Sam Stosur in her WTA Tour
debut.[2] They were also proud of her in particular for winning the 2018 US Open. [150]