This is a timeline of notable moments in the history of women's ordination in the world's religious traditions.
It is not an exhaustive list of all historic or contemporary ordinations of women.
See also: Timeline of women in religion
Prince Siddhartha with Mahaprajapati Gautami
Heleanor M. Davison, likely the first woman ordained in the Methodist tradition (1866)
Julia A.J. Foote, first woman ordained in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (1894)
Alma Bridwell White, first woman ordained as a bishop in the United States (1918)
Rabbi Regina Jonas, first woman ordained as a rabbi (1935)
Her Grace The Most Reverend, Kay Goldsworthy, Archbishop of Perth, one of the first women in the Anglican Church of Australia to be ordained (1986) and the first woman to be ordained as an archbishop in the church (2018)
Rabbi Angela Warnick Buchdahl, the first Asian-American woman cantor (1999) and rabbi (2001)
Dhammananda Bhikkhuni, the first Thai woman to receive full ordination as a Theravada nun (2003)
Rabbi Alysa Stanton, the first Black female rabbi
The Right Reverend Libby Lane, Bishop of Derby, the first woman to be appointed as a bishop by the Church of England
