At the European Clay season she fell to Dinara Safina in the second round of the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix and suffered a back to back loss at the Estoril Open and Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open, which caused her to drop out of the top 40. At the French Open, she lost to Nadia Petrova in the second round. At the grass-court season, Szávay played at the Aegon International losing to Marion Bartoli in the second round. And at Wimbledon, she lost to Ekaterina Makarova in the very first round. However, she followed it up with back-to-back titles in GDF Suez Grand Prix upsetting Alexandra Dulgheru in the semifinals and a repeat of last year's final defeating Patty Schnyder and in ECM Prague Open defeating Barbora Záhlavová-Strýcová in three sets. Szávay missed the Australian Open and the Australian season because of illness. Her next scheduled tournament was the Open GdF Suez but she withdrew because of a back injury. She came back at the BNP Paribas Open where she won her first match in nearly five months by beating American veteran Jill Craybas. She lost to Alisa Kleybanova in the second round. Her next tournament was the Sony Ericsson Open but she lost again in the second round, to Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Her next tournament was the Andalucia Tennis Experience where she lost in the second round to Svetlana Kuznetsova. She then missed the Grand Prix SAR La Princesse Lalla Meryem and the Barcelona Ladies Open due to the back injury. At the French Open, Szávay lost in the first round to qualifier Olga Govortsova. For the remainder of the year, Szávay took time off to recover from the back injury, which was career-threatening. Her first tournament of 2012 was the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in April. However, she fell in the first round of qualifying to Austrian Yvonne Meusburger. Next, Szávay played the Olympics, losing in the first round to home favorite Elena Baltacha. Partnering Tímea Babos, she lost in the first round of doubles. In August, she headed to the United States for the New Haven Open at Yale, where she lost to Carla Suárez Navarro in the first round.