Professional wrestling is a dramatic enactment ofwrestling as aspectator sport.[1] As is the norm for this sport,women's professional wrestling is organized by wrestling federations calledpromotions. Some promotions are exclusively for women, while others have separate divisions for women. Among the nations that have women's professional wrestling areAustralia,Bolivia,Canada,Japan,Mexico, theUnited Kingdom, and theUnited States.
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In the United States, there are currently four majorprofessional wrestling promotions that have a unified division with a title:WWE,Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA),Ring of Honor (ROH), andAll Elite Wrestling (AEW), in addition to a number of independent promotions with women's wrestling divisions and championships. TNA's female wrestlers are branded as theKnockouts, while ROH's female talent were formally known as theWomen of Honor, and WWE's female talent were known as theDivas until 2016.
Shimmer Women Athletes, which operated from 2005 to 2021,[2] is recognized as the earliest and most prominent promotion to take women's wrestling more seriously.[3]
Two notable women-only promotions are theWorld Wrestling Network'sShine Wrestling brand (est. 2012) inFlorida, which began as a sister to Shimmer; andWomen of Wrestling (WOW) (est. 2000, 2012) inLos Angeles. In addition to Shine,Rise Wrestling is another promotion that was established as one of Shimmer's sister promotions and was originally adevelopmental program for the latter company. In 2018, they began a partnership with Impact Wrestling, which saw Impact talent compete at Rise events.[4]
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Women's wrestling has maintained a recognized world champion since 1937, whenMildred Burke won theoriginal World Women's title.[5] She then formed the World Women's Wrestling Association in the early 1950s and recognized herself as the first champion, although the championship would be vacated upon her retirement in 1956. TheNational Wrestling Alliance however, ceased to acknowledge Burke astheir Women's World champion in 1954, and instead acknowledgedJune Byers as champion after a controversial finish to a high-profile match between Burke and Byers that year. Upon Byers' retirement in 1964,The Fabulous Moolah, who won a junior heavyweight version of theNWA World Women's Championship (the predecessor to the originalWWE Women's Championship) in a tournament back in 1958, was recognized by most NWA promoters as champion by default.
In WWE, female professional wrestlers are members of one of the promotion's four women's divisions who compete in both singles competition andtag teams. WWE has six active women's championships: theWWE Raw Women's Championship (which is the successor to theWWE Divas Championship, which in turn succeeded the originalWWE Women's Championship created in 1956) for theRaw brand, theWWE SmackDown Women's Championship for theSmackDown brand, theWWE Women's Tag Team Championship, theNXT Women's Championship andNXT Women's Tag Team Championship for theNXT brand, and theNXT UK Women's Championship for theNXT UK brand. The Fabulous Moolah is recognized asWWE's firstWomen's Champion, with her reign beginning in 1956. In 2002, WWE began what was called theWWE brand extension, where wrestlers and championships became exclusive to one of WWE's brands. At first, the Women's Championship could be defended on any brand, but later that year, it became exclusive to theRaw brand. In 2008, WWE created theWWE Divas Championship as a counterpart title for theSmackDown brand. The two titles were eventually unified in September 2010. The Women's Championship was then retired in favor of keeping the Divas Championship, which became briefly known as the Unified WWE Divas Championship. The brand extension ended in 2011.
In April 2016 atWrestleMania 32, the Divas Championship was retired and subsequently replaced with a newWWE Women's Championship, which has a separate title history from the original. WWE then reintroduced the brand extension in July 2016 and the Women's Championship (now Raw Women's Championship) became exclusive to Raw. In August 2016, SmackDown created the SmackDown Women's Championship as a counterpart title. In WWE'sNXT brand, women compete for the NXT Women's Championship, which was established in 2013. TheNXT UK brand would create its counterpart title, theNXT UK Women's Championship, in 2018. TheWWE Women's Tag Team Championship was announced on the 24 December 2018 edition ofMonday Night Raw. The inaugural champions wereThe Boss 'n' Hug Connection (Sasha Banks & Bayley) who defeatedThe IIconics (Peyton Royce & Billie Kay),The Riot Squad (Liv Morgan & Sarah Logan), Nia Jax & Tamina,Mandy Rose & Sonya Deville and Naomi & Carmella at the2019 Elimination Chamber pay-per-view.
Impact's women's championship is theKnockouts World Championship, which debuted on 14 October 2007. Its inaugural champion wasGail Kim, who won the title atBound for Glory 2007. The promotion's tag team championship is known as theKnockouts World Tag Team Championship. The title was introduced atNo Surrender 2009 and its inaugural champions were the team ofSarita andTaylor Wilde. The titles were initially deactivated on the 20 June 2013 episode ofImpact!, but their return was announced atBound for Glory 2020.[6] AtHard To Kill, Fire N Flava (Kiera Hogan andTasha Steelz) won a tournament to become the tag team champions.[7][8]
ROH's has sporadically featured women's wrestling matches at its shows, dating back to a former working relationship with Shimmer. By 2017, ROH had been regularly featuring women's wrestling under theWomen of Honor banner, culminating in the creation of theWomen of Honor World Championship in December 2017 and the announcement atFinal Battle 2017 of a tournament to crown the first champion. Stars fromJapan'sWorld Wonder Ring Stardom also participated in the tournament.Sumie Sakai became the inaugural Women of Honor Champion when she won the title atSupercard of Honor XII in 2018.
In 2015, WWE revamped its women's divisions by hiring mainly independent wrestlers as opposed to models, initially known as the "Diva's Revolution" and later known as the "Women's Revolution".NXT TakeOver: Respect, held on 7 October 2015, saw then-NXT Women's ChampionBayley defend her title againstSasha Banks in a 30–minuteIron Man match in themain event. This was the first women's match to headline a major WWE event, and the first time in WWE history that a women's match had this stipulation. A newWWE Women's Championship was unveiled and contested atWrestleMania 32 on 3 April 2016, between then-Divas ChampionCharlotte Flair,Becky Lynch andSasha Banks in a triple threat match. After Wrestlemania, the Diva's Championship and the "Diva's" branding would be retired.
Following the2016 WWE Brand Extension, the new Women's Championship would become exclusive to the Raw brand, resulting in the creation of theSmackDown Women's Championship.Becky Lynch would become the inaugural champion atBacklash after winning aSix-pack elimination challenge. The following month, atHell in a Cell, Charlotte would face Sasha Banks in a match for theRaw Women's Championship in what would be the first time a women's match was the main event of a WWE pay-per-view, as well as the first-ever women'sHell in a Cell match. At the 2017Money in the Bank pay-per-view, the first-ever Women's Money in the Bank ladder match was held with the winner receiving a contract for aSmackDown Women's Championship match. The following month, WWE would hold a women's wrestling tournament called theMae Young Classic, named after the lateMae Young.[9]
In 2018, the JanuaryRoyal Rumble pay-per-view would feature the first-ever women'sRoyal Rumble match in the main event, which would be the longest women's match in WWE history at the time. The following month, at the 2018Elimination Chamber pay-per-view, the first-ever women'sElimination Chamber match took place. Later that year, WWE would present its first all-women's pay-per-view event:WWE Evolution. The Women's Evolution would culminate atWrestleMania 35 in 2019, whereCharlotte Flair,Becky Lynch, andRonda Rousey would compete in aWinner Takes Alltriple threat match for the Raw and SmackDown Women's championships in what would be the first time that female superstars would main event WWE's flagship event.
Nikki and Brie Bella, twin sisters who were inducted into WWEs Hall of Fame is 2021, came out of retirement for 2022 Women's Royal Rumble.[10] Brie was the first to win a WWE Championship, but Nikki held the championship twice and held that reign longer than Brie.[11]
Promotions such as theNaked Women's Wrestling League showcasednude females"battling" in the ring for titillation. The NWWL broadcast shows around the world, and its wrestlers were featured in magazines such asPenthouse,Playboy, andMaxim.
In Japan, women's professional wrestling is calledjoshi puroresu (女子プロレス), orjoshi puro for short. Women's wrestling is usually handled by promotions that specialize injoshi puroresu, rather than by divisions of otherwise male-dominated promotions.Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling, a men's promotion, had a small women's division that competed with women wrestlers from other promotions.
All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (est. 1968) was the dominantjoshi puro organization from the 1970s to the 1990s. AJW's first major star was Mach Fumiake in 1974, followed in 1975 byJackie Sato andMaki Ueda (the "Beauty Pair").
In the early 1980s,Jaguar Yokota andDevil Masami became the stars of a second wave of women wrestlers who succeeded the glamor-oriented generation defined by the Beauty Pair. That decade later saw the rise of the "Crush Gals"Chigusa Nagayo andLioness Asuka, a tag team who achieved a level of mainstream success as women wrestlers that not only was unprecedented in Japan, but unheard of in the history of women's professional wrestling.[12][13][14][15] The Crush Gals' long-running feud withKaoru "Dump" Matsumoto and herGokuaku Domei ("Atrocious Alliance") stable was extremely popular in Japan; their televised matches were some of the highest-rated broadcasts in the history of Japanese television, and the promotion regularly filled arenas to capacity.[16]
In the 1990s, American wrestling journalistDave Meltzer rated severaljoshi puroresu matchesfive stars—a rarely-awarded perfect score on theCornette scale—in his periodical theWrestling Observer Newsletter.
Prominentjoshi wrestlers of the 1990s includeManami Toyota,Bull Nakano,Akira Hokuto,Cutie Suzuki,Aja Kong,Megumi Kudo,Shinobu Kandori,Kyoko Inoue,Takako Inoue (who is unrelated to Kyoko),Dynamite Kansai, andMayumi Ozaki.
Somejoshi have a high-flying style that precedes theX Division of men's wrestling in North America. Since, for cultural reasons, women wrestlers are not divided intoweight classes, these wrestlers compete for special titles comparable to the "junior heavyweight" class in men's wrestling.Arsion'sSky High of Arsion Championship (est. 1999) and NEO Japan'sHigh Speed Championship (est. 2009) are two such titles. Recently, Marigold'sMarigold Super Fly Championship (est. 2024) has arisen.
In 2010, former Arsion andJDStar promoter Rossy Ogawa, retired wrestlerFuka Kakimoto, and veteran wrestlerNanae Takahashi started a newjoshi puro promotion,World Wonder Ring Stardom. Stardom, considered the premier joshi promotion in modern times, was purchased byNew Japan Pro-Wrestling parent companyBushiroad in 2019.
In April 2024,Rossy Ogawa (formerly of AJPW and Stardom) founded a new women's promotion calledDream Star Fighting Marigold orMarigold.[17][18]
In Mexico, professional wrestling is calledlucha libre ("free fight"), and women wrestlers are calledluchadoras.
TheConsejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL), or World Wrestling Council, has a women's division. The top of the division is theCMLL World Women's Championship.Keiko "Bull" Nakano won the first CMLL championship in 1992.
That same year, wrestling promoterAntonio Peña left the CMLL to form a new promotion called theAsistencia Asesoría y Administración (AAA). In addition to the annualReina de Reinas Championship (Queen of Queens Championship), AAA also organizes theWorld Mixed Tag Team Championship, in which tag teams of one woman and one man compete.
In 2000, businessman Luciano Alberto Garcia de Luna started an all-woman promotion company called Lucha Libre Femenil (LLF) inMonterrey.[19]
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Current notable independent promotions includePro-Wrestling: EVE,Bellatrix Female Warriors, The British Bombshells, and Fierce Females.
Notable British women wrestlers include:Lady Blossom,Xia Brookside,Nikki Cross,Blair Davenport,Sadie Gibbs,Jamie Hayter,Laura James,Jetta,Klondyke Kate,Katie Lea,Dani Luna,Millie McKenzie,Tegan Nox,Paige,Jemma Palmer,Kay Lee Ray, etc.
Pro wrestlerMadison Eagles and her husband Ryan co-founded thePro Wrestling Women's Alliance (PWWA) in 2007. This independentpromotion is affiliated withPro Wrestling Alliance Australia, as well as formerly withShimmer Women Athletes. They also had affiliations withGlobal Force Wrestling of the United States while the latter was active.
It is the only all-female wrestling promotion in Australia.
InBolivia, female wrestlers calledFighting Cholitas dress in the traditional clothing of theAymara people.[20][21] They were the inspiration for thecomic bookSuper Cholita, which premiered in 2007.
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NCW Femmes Fatales is an independent promotion founded in 2009; its headquarters are inMontreal.
In 2023, wrestlerNikki Cross completed her master's degree in history; her dissertation was on the subject of women's wrestling.[22][23][24]
