Serena Williams announces her engagement to Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian

The tennis star shared a poem on a Reddit thread for people to share their engagement stories

Her fiancee Ohanian co-founded the social news site Reddit with his University of Virginia classmate Steve Huffman from a two-bedroom startup in Medford, Massachusetts (Getty)

Serena Williams has announced she is engaged to Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian.

Rather aptly, the tennis star, who won her seventh Wimbledon singles title in July, has used the social media platform to share the news.

Sharing a poem on a Reddit thread for people to share their engagement stories, Williams told of how Ohanian had taken her to Rome, where they first met, to propose.

“I came home A little late Someone had a bag packed for me And a carriage waited,” the 35-year-old wrote. “Destination: Rome To escort me to my very own ‘charming’.

“Back to where our stars first collided And now it was full circle At the same table we first met by chance But by choice Down on knee He said 4 words And I said yes.”

Ohanian commented on her Reddit thread, writing: “And you made me the happiest man on the planet”. Another user quipped the score was "love-love".

The 33-year-old, who is the executive chairman of Reddit, shared Williams’s post on his Facebook page, alongside the message: “she said yes”.

A photo Williams shared of the couple at a fancy dress party four weeks ago has already been inundated with congratulatory messages. Williams and Ohanian have been dating since around late 2015 but chose to keep their relationship relatively quiet. The pair has yet to reveal when the wedding will take place.

Williams is widely seen as one of the greatest tennis players in history. This year she won her seventh Wimbledon singles title and 22nd Grand Slam singles title but fell to world number two ranking. She was the highest paid female athlete in 2016, earning $28.9 million in prize money and endorsements.

Her fiancee Ohanian co-founded the social news site Reddit with his University of Virginia classmate Steve Huffman from a two-bedroom startup in Medford, Massachusetts 11 years ago. They were just 22 at the time. The news site is a social media community where users can submit content. It has 542 million monthly visitors, making it the 25th most visited website in the world.