5 most dominant UFC championship reigns in the women's divisions

Back in 2011, UFC president Dana White revealed that he had no intentions of ever letting women compete in his organization in a now-infamous interview with TMZ Sports. Oh, how times have changed.

With the emergence of Ronda Rousey in 2012, the UFC finally opened the door for women to compete on the world's biggest stage. Since then, we've had numerous female champions and stand-out fighters who've taken the sport by storm.

The skill level in women's MMA today is leaps and bounds ahead of what it was a decade ago. Moreover, the excitement going into pivotal championship matchups featuring women is arguably almost on par with the attention garnered by their male peers, a trend unlike anything we've seen in other sports.

On that note, here are the five most dominant championship reigns in the women's divisions in the UFC.

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#5. Cris Cyborg – former UFC featherweight champion

Cris Cyborg's time in the UFC famously ended unceremoniously. Regardless, before her exit from the organization, she enjoyed a year-long reign atop the women's featherweight division. In fact, the company created a women's 145-pound weight class just to accommodate her in the first place.

The Brazilian is a former Srikeforce and Invicta featherweight champion. Between 2009 and 2016, all but one of her professional fights were championship bouts and she had seemingly cleaned out the 145-pound division in Invicta. Having already defended her belt three times, the masses started clamoring for a move to the UFC.

However, the Dana White-led promotion didn't have a 145-pound division at the time. Cyborg was scheduled to fight in the 135-pound division in her first two appearances in the famed octagon, but grueling weight cuts prompted the promotion to make them catchweight bouts.

After Cyborg emerged victorious in two 140-pound catchweight fights, the UFC brass finally created a featherweight division. With a vacant title on the line, the Brazilian defeated Tonya Evinger to further solidify her claim to being the best female fighter on the planet.

In her first title defense, she cruised to a comfortable unanimous decision win over Holly Holm. Just three months later, she retained her title with a TKO victory against Yana Kunitskaya. With no new contenders on the horizon, Cyborg accepted a fight against then-bantamweight queen Amanda Nunes.

Nunes produced one of the most shocking moments in women's MMA history at UFC 232, coming away with a jaw-dropping 51-second KO victory to become a two-division titleholder. This was Cyborg's first defeat in over 13 years.

#4. Joanna Jędrzejczyk – former UFC strawweight champion

Joanna Jędrzejczyk quickly emerged as a fan favorite upon joining the UFC. She embraces the role of the antagonist in the lead-up to her fights and clearly understands how to promote a matchup.

After compiling stellar runs in both kickboxing and Muay Thai, Jędrzejczyk transitioned to MMA in 2012 and kicked off her professional career with a scintillating 6-0 start in her native country, Poland.

Upon signing with the world's premier MMA promotion in 2014, Jędrzejczyk ripped through her fellow strawweights for the next three years, winning the strawweight title and defending it five times.

Watch highlights from Joanna Jędrzejczyk's championship reign below:

Going into UFC 217 in 2017, Jędrzejczyk's professional record stood at 14-0 and many expected her to remain the champion for a long time to come. Looking to defend her strawweight title for the sixth time, the Polish phenom took on TUF alum Rose Namajunas at the iconic Madison Square Garden arena in New York City.

'Thug' Rose famously shocked the world that night, knocking out Jędrzejczyk in the very first round of their championship bout.

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#3. Ronda Rousey – former UFC bantamweight champion

If not for Ronda Rousey, who knows where women's MMA would be today? The charismatic Olympian singlehandedly convinced Dana White to allow women into the UFC back in 2012 and the rest, as they say, is history.

After winning a bronze medal at the 2008 Olympic Games, the judoka transitioned to MMA and made a name for herself in Strikeforce. In her first six MMA bouts, Rousey came away with first-round submission victories to establish herself as the most promising female fighter in the world.

As she held Strikeforce's 135-pound title when the promotion was absorbed by the UFC, Rousey was handed the UFC's bantamweight belt despite never having competed in the famed octagon. 'Rowdy' finished her opponents in her next six title defenses, which saw her star power reach astronomical heights.

Watch a compilation of Ronda Rousey's best finishes below:

Ronda Rousey's success on the world's biggest stage saw her emerge as one of the biggest stars in the sport. She was featured on numerous notable magazine covers, appeared on big-time talk shows, featured in Hollywood movies and was even on the cover of the official UFC video game alongside fellow superstar Conor McGregor.

Shockingly, her championship reign came to a screeching halt when she was thoroughly outclassed by Holly Holm, who knocked her out in devastating fashion back in 2015.

#2. Amanda Nunes – former UFC bantamweight and current featherweight champion

Amanda Nunes is arguably the greatest female fighter to ever grace the octagon. After going 2-1 in her first three bouts in the UFC, Nunes was regarded as just another competitor in the women's bantamweight division, back when Ronda Rousey was the reigning 135-pound titleholder.

Nunes made her way up the rankings with victories against Shayna Baszler, Sara McMann, and Valentina Shevchenko to earn a shot at gold. In 2016, she won the belt with an incredible first-round submission victory over Miesha Tate.

She then beat Rousey, cementing her status as the best female fighter at 135 pounds in the world. With no new contenders for then-featherweight champion Cris Cyborg, Nunes made a successful move up to 145 pounds to become the first-ever two-division female champion in promotional history.

She remains the only woman to accomplish this feat.

All the way until late 2021, Nunes held the top spot in the women's pound-for-pound rankings. She defended her bantamweight belt five times, in addition to defending her featherweight title twice. It felt as though the self-proclaimed GOAT was running out of real challengers going into UFC 269, where she took on Julianna 'The Venezuelan Vixen' Pena, who was 2-2 in her last four octagon outings.

Pena took the fight to 'The Lioness' unlike anyone had done previously, repeatedly catching the long-reigning champion with her pin-point jab. In the second round, Nunes looked noticeably fatigued. Sensing her opportunity, the challenger dragged the Brazilian titleholder down to the mat and locked in a rear-naked choke to complete one of the biggest upsets in combat sports history.

Nunes is still the reigning titleholder in the women's 145-pound division. However, that particular weight class is in a state of disarray at the moment, as is evident in the fact that the promotion doesn't even have rankings for the women competing at featherweight.

Nevertheless, 'The Lioness' is still a UFC champion.

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#1. Valentina Shevchenko – UFC flyweight champion

Valentina Shevchenko has solidified her status as one of the best pound-for-pound fighters on the planet in recent years, irrespective of gender. The lifelong martial artist has enjoyed an astonishing martial arts career so far and is also one of the most dominant champions in all of combat sports.

Shevchenko spent almost half her career competing at 135 pounds before dropping down to the 125-pound division. Despite clearly being undersized for bantamweight, ‘Bullet’ emerged as one of the best fighters in the weight class, picking up wins over former titleholder Holly Holm and current champion Julianna Pena.

Her impressive run in the 135-pound division pre-dated the UFC’s 125-pound weight class altogether. When the flyweight division was eventually created, she secured a shot at the vacant title with a win over Priscila Cachoeira, and subsequently defeated Joanna Jedrzejczyk to become the champion.

'Bullet' has been defending her flyweight belt ever since.

Shevchenko holds an overall MMA record of 22-3, with eight of her victories coming via KO/TKO.

Notably, she appears to take pleasure in using her opponents' strengths against them. In her fights against Julianna Pena and Jessica Andrade, two fighters who many believed would have the grappling advantage, 'Bullet' took both fighters down and dominated the exchanges on the ground before securing finishes.

Despite her evident improvements in the grappling realm, Shevchenko's bread and butter lies in the striking arts. The multi-time kickboxing world champion's stand-up is arguably the best in all of mixed martial arts and her headkick knockout against Jessica Eye remains one of the greatest finishes in women's MMA history.

Shevchenko has vowed to remain atop the division for a long time to come. Her impeccable skills, which have been honed since she was a child, ensure that she hardly sustains any damage in her fights.

While there don't appear to be too many legitimate threats to her flyweight throne, a return to bantamweight is still on the cards, as is the prospect of her becoming a two-division champion.

Watch highlights of Valentina Shevchenko's championship reign below: