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Hell in a Cell was introduced in 1997 at Badd Blood where Shawn Michaels took on the Undertaker. This soon turned out to be one of the most unforgiving structures in WWE. This was so good that in 2009, WWE decided to give the devil's playground a namesake Pay Per View. Even though there is no denying that the annual installment of hell in a cell devalued it, it has given us some quality matches all around.
In this list, we are going to take a look at all the Hell in a Cell PPVs between 2009 and 2017 and rank them from worst to best. So buckle your seatbelts because we are in for a long journey.
#9 Hell in a Cell 2010
Hell in a Cell 2010 was bad. It was the second edition of the PPV. It featured a good card and on the first look, the results were excellent. Newcomer Wade Barrett scored a victory on John Cena, Kane bested his brother twice in a row and the newly crowned fan favorite Randy Orton successfully retained his WWE Championship against Sheamus. But the action was mediocre at best. The main event between the brothers of destruction was lackluster, to say the least.
Other matches in the card included the bout between Edge and Jack Swagger, Natalya and Michelle McCool, and the triple threat submission match between Daniel Bryan, The Miz, and John Morrison for the United States championship.
#8 Hell in a Cell 2012
Ryback was cast in as the opponent of CM Punk after John Cena suffered an injury and could not compete at Hell in a Cell 2012. Randy Orton had a good opening match against Alberto Del Rio and the match of the night was definitely the world heavyweight championship match between Sheamus and the Big Show.
The decision of putting Ryback in the main event turned out to be a blunder since the big guy was not ready for the main event at that time and he lost his momentum after the loss to CM Punk. Even from a wrestling perspective, the match was nothing special.
Even the rest of the card was nothing special.
#7 Hell in a Cell 2013
The 2013 edition of Hell in a Cell was built around the Authority holding Daniel Bryan down. Although Bryan pinned Randy Orton at night of champions to win the WWE championship, Triple H vacated the title because of the referee's fast count. Their battleground clash yielded no result. Shawn Michaels was the special guest referee for their clash inside the cell. The match was good but rest of the card, except the opening match was nothing to write home about.
Another marquee match in this event was John Cena challenging Alberto Del Rio for the world heavyweight championship. But it also failed to deliver.
#6 Hell in a Cell 2016
The 2016 edition of HIAC was the first ever HIAC after the brand split. Sasha Banks and Charlotte Flair faced off in the main event of the event, making it the first ever WWE PPV with a women's main event. The match of the night was the Universal championship match between Kevin Owens and Seth Rollins. It was the second hell in a cell event to feature 3 hell in a cell matches.
The rest of the card was mediocre. Numerous botches made the main event cringy. The United States championship match between Rusev and Roman Reigns was good. Other than that, the PPV was sub-par.
#5 Hell in a Cell 2011
If it weren't for the chaos during the main event, this would have been ranked lower than this. Dissatisfied by their punishment, The Miz and R-Truth hijacked the main event and caused chaos. Alberto Del Rio pinned CM Punk to retain his championship during this mess, but he was not free from the beatdown. Del Rio, Punk and Cena, along with the referee and cameramen were assaulted by Awesome Truth. This caused the authority head Triple H to snap and call the police.
The rest of the card was not impressive, but the solid cliffhanger ending warrants a high position.
#4 Hell in a Cell 2014
Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins had a brilliant feud after the shield broke up and this was the culmination of it. This is also the only Hell in a Cell PPV not to feature a single world championship match as the then-champion Brock Lesnar was a part-timer.
The main event between Rollins and Ambrose was brilliant. Even the ever-repeating match between John Cena and Randy Orton was impressive. This match had lots of close finishes. Randy even countered a shoulder block tackle to an RKO. Rest of the card was also good. The Intercontinental championship match and the tag team championship match were impressive.
#3 Hell in a Cell 2009
The inaugural Hell in a Cell PPV saw three cell matches. This was the first time WWE ever had more than one Cell match in the same PPV. In fact, they went on to have 3 "Hell in a Cell" matches - one each for the world titles and one for the main event between DX and Legacy.
The main event match saw some brutal sledgehammer shots and rough beatings and was definitely the match of the night. The WWE championship match between Randy Orton and John Cena was also really good. For the first time ever, the viper defeated the Cenation leader clean. The world heavyweight championship was a bit underwhelming as Undertaker quickly defeated the promising youngster CM Punk. Overall, the PPV was good.
#2 Hell in a Cell 2015
Hell in a Cell 2015 was a high-quality show. It had a hard-hitting match between Undertaker and Brock Lesnar, a good match between Roman Reigns and Bray Wyatt, and also had a really good WWE championship match between Kane and Seth Rollins.
But this event will always be remembered for the Undertaker vs. Brock Lesnar match. The Undertaker cost Brock Lesnar his WWE World Heavyweight championship match against Seth Rollins at Battleground. Undertaker then proceeded to defeat Lesnar at Summerslam in a controversial manner.
The last match in their feud was an absolute barn burner. It was the match of the night. It had hard-hitting action, blood and a believable ending when Lesnar slammed Undertaker onto the exposed mat for the three count.
#1 Hell in a Cell 2017
Unless you are biased towards Undertaker or Brock Lesnar, it would be easy to comprehend why HIAC 2017 is the best hell in a cell event till date. It had an absolute war between New day and the Usos as the opening match, had a really good triple threat match for the United States Championship and the main event was outstanding.
The build to the event was nothing outstanding - with the main focus around the main event. But the matches delivered big and that was enough for the fans. This event ended with Shane throwing himself from the roof of the Cell and Sami Zayn turning heel. The match between the Smackdown live commissioner and the prizefighter itself was brilliant but the heel turn from Zayn was the icing on the cake.
The New day and Usos showed us why they are the best tag teams in the entire roster. Their match was brutal and the performance from all the five guys was outstanding. The only downside of the event was the WWE Championship match between Jinder Mahal and Shinsuke Nakamura. But we can easily ignore that because the rest of the card was so good.
