Saina entered 2017 with maiden Malaysia open Grand Prix Gold title. She went on to reach the quarterfinals of the All England Championships 2018 and couldn't do well much of the year due to injury and she was still recovering. In August she was seeded 12th in World Badminton Championships at Glasgow. Nehwal again dug deep into her reservoir to eke out a 21-19 18-21 21-15 win over world No. 31 Kristy Gilmour of Scotland in the quarterfinal. However she lost in the semifinal in tight 3 setter to eventual winner Nozomi Okhuhara of Japan thus bagging bronze medal. This is Saina's second consecutive medal at World Badminton Championship and a record breaking 7th consecutive quarterfinal. She then won the 82nd national badminton championship by beating P. V. Sindhu in the final.

The BWF Superseries, launched on 14 December 2006 and implemented in 2007, is a series of elite badminton tournaments, sanctioned by Badminton World Federation (BWF). BWF Superseries has two levels: Superseries and Superseries Premier. A season of Superseries features twelve tournaments around the world, which introduced since 2011, with successful players invited to the Superseries Finals held at the year end.

The BWF Grand Prix has two levels: Grand Prix and Grand Prix Gold. It is a series of badminton tournaments, sanctioned by Badminton World Federation (BWF) since 2007. The World Badminton Grand Prix sanctioned by International Badminton Federation (IBF) since 1983.

She became the first Indian woman to reach the quarter finals at the Olympic Games when she upset world number five and fourth seed Wang Chen of Hong Kong in a three-game thriller. In the quarter-finals Saina lost a nail biting 3-gamer to world number 16 Maria Kristin Yulianti. In September 2008, she won the Yonex Chinese Taipei Open 2008 beating Lydia Cheah Li Ya of Malaysia 21–8 21–19. Maria Yulianti had earlier lost her quarter-final match to Pia Bernadet, Saina's semi-final opponent, thus denying Saina a rematch. Saina was named "The Most Promising Player" in 2008. She reached the world super series semifinals in the month of December 2008.

In June 2009, she became the first Indian to win a BWF Super Series title, the most prominent badminton series of the world by winning the Indonesia Open. She beat Chinese Wang Lin in the final 12–21, 21–18, 21–9. Saina on winning the tournament said, "I had been longing to win a super series tournament since my quarter final appearance at the Olympics". Saina is on the par with the likes of Prakash Padukone and her mentor Pullela Gopichand who both won the all England championships which are of similar status to the super series. In August 2009, she reached to the quarterfinals of the World Championships, losing to the second seed Wang Lin.

Saina Nehwal confirmed her participation for the 2010 Hong Kong Super series to held from 7 to 12 Dec 2010 and is also the penultimate super series tournament of the year. This would be Saina's first super series tournament after a gap of more than 5 months since her win in the 2010 Indonesia Super Series in June 2010. On 12 December 2010, Saina Nehwal defeated Wang Shixian 15–21, 21–16, 21–17 in the final of the 2010 Hong Kong Super Series to win her fourth career Super Series title.

Saina was defeated in the first round of 2011 China Open Super Series Premier by World No. 8 Bae Youn-joo of South Korea 21–15, 22–24, 15–21. During the season ending tournament in December, Saina Nehwal created history by becoming the first Indian singles player to reach the final of BWF Super Series Masters Finals after defeating World No. 5 Tine Baun of Denmark to cruise 21–17, 21–18 in the semifinals of the 2011 BWF Super Series Masters Finals in Liuzhou (China). She went on to lose the final 21–18, 13–21, 13–21 against the World No. 1 Chinese Wang Yihan in a contest lasting over an hour.

On 17 June 2012, Saina Nehwal won the Indonesia Open Super Series by defeating World No. 3 Li Xuerui of China 13–21, 22–20 21–19. It was her 3rd Indonesia Open title. On 4 August 2012, she won the bronze medal at the London Olympics when China's Wang Xin retired from the match after an injury with the match at 18–21, 0–1. On 21 October 2012, she won the Denmark Open Super Series Premier after defeating Wang Yihan 21–12 12–7 in the semifinal. Yihan got retired hurt in this match after losing first set and trailing in second set. In the final Saina defeated Juliane Schenk of Germany in two straight sets to lift her first Denmark open trophy.

Making her third appearance at the Olympics, Nehwal, the fifth seed, won her opening match against the unseeded Lohaynny Vicente in straight games. However, she lost her second match against the world no. 61 Marija Ulitina by 18–21, 19–21, thereby making exit at the group stage. Her coach cited the week-old knee injury for her below par performance at the event.

On 26 January 2014 Saina defeated World Championship bronze medalist P.V. Sindhu 21–14, 21–17 to win the Women's Singles of India Open Grand Prix Gold Tournament. On March,2014 World No. 4 Saina Nehwal, who had a win-loss record of 4–2 against the Chinese ace Wang Shixian, crashed out of the 2014 All England Super Series Premier after losing her quarter-final match. Saina took revenge of All England loss by defeating Wang Shixian in semifinals of 2014 Australian Super Series. In final on June 29, 2014 Saina defeated Spain's Carolina Marin 21–18, 21–11 to win Women's Singles of 2014 Australian Super Series. The win helped her to reach the ranking of World no. 7, climbing two spots.

Defending Champion Saina Nehwal won the 2015 India Open Grand Prix Gold by defeating Spain's Carolina Marin in the Final. She became the first Indian woman shuttler to reach the finals of All England Open Badminton Championships, but lost to Carolina in the final. On 29 March 2015, Saina won her maiden women's singles title at the India Open BWF Super Series beating Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand. This assured her of becoming World number 1 when the latest BWF rankings were released on April 2. Thus, she became the first Indian women's player to be World No.1 in badminton. On 16th Aug 2015, Saina went down fighting to Carolina Marin again, in the Final of World Badminton Championships held in Jakarta, settling for the Silver. defending champion Saina Nehwal fought hard before going down to Li Xuerei in the final of china open

Record against Super Series finalists, World Championships semifinalists and Olympic quarterfinalists (as of 12 June 2016):

The BWF World Tour, announced on 19 March 2017 and implemented in 2018, is a series of elite badminton tournaments, sanctioned by Badminton World Federation (BWF). The BWF World Tour are divided into six levels, namely World Tour Finals, Super 1000, Super 750, Super 500, Super 300 (part of the HSBC World Tour), and the BWF Tour Super 100.

She had a good start to the year reaching finals of Indonesia Masters 2018 Enroute to the finals she beat Chen Yufei,Chen Xioxin (both of China) , P.V. Sindhu in the Quarterfinal and Ratchanok Intanon in the Semis. She won her second gold in Commonwealth Games women's singles after beating P V Sindhu in the final and eventually led Indian team to another gold medal in mixed team event