World championships in WWE

Earlier that year in March, the WWF acquired World Championship Wrestling (WCW), which shortly after began The Invasion storyline, a war between the WWF and the combined faction of former WCW and Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) wrestlers called The Alliance.

This culminated at Survivor Series in November where the WWF won The Invasion war, disbanding The Alliance.

[8] As the undisputed champion, Reigns was allowed to appear on both brands; as a result of the 2023 WWE Draft, however, he was drafted to SmackDown, thus making both championships under the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship banner exclusive to the brand.

[20][21] On the June 2, 2023, episode of SmackDown, in celebration of Reigns reaching 1,000 days as Universal Champion, he was presented with a single belt, which features the same "Network Logo" design of the individual titles, but with notable differences.

[22][23] His manager Paul Heyman had continued to carry around the standard WWE and Universal Championship belts until the end of July.

[24] Cody Rhodes would defeat Reigns at WrestleMania XL Night 2 on April 7th, 2024, to win the title, and he has continued to hold the singular Undisputed belt, now with his own logos on the side plates, while continuing the individual lineages of both championships.

However, after reigning WWE Undisputed Champion Brock Lesnar signed an exclusive deal to only appear on SmackDown, Raw was left without a world championship.

[34] In June 2006, WWE established a third brand dubbed ECW on which stars from the former promotion and newer talent competed.

In June 2012, WWE established the NXT brand as their developmental territory to replace Florida Championship Wrestling.

The NXT Championship was subsequently established on July 1, 2012 when it always was a world title but just on the developmental brand, Seth Rollins defeated Jinder Mahal in the tournament finals to become the inaugural champion.

Uniquely, the Crown Jewel championship belt remains in Saudi Arabia at the WWE Experience building.

The men and women's WWE Crown Jewel champions instead receive championship rings.

The following list shows the wrestlers that are currently holding all active men's world championships in WWE.

The following list shows retired men's world championships and the final title holders before the belts were deactivated by WWE.

The following list shows the inaugural holders for each world championship created and/or promoted by WWE.

The following list shows the ten longest world championship reigns in WWE history.

The following list shows the longest reigning champion for each world championship created and/or promoted by WWE.

The following list shows the wrestlers with the most reigns for each world championship created and/or promoted by WWE.

The following list shows the wrestlers who have the most world championship reigns in total, combining all titles they have held as recognized by WWE.

This list also shows the titles that they won to achieve this record (minimum five world championship reigns).

WWE 's inaugural world champion, Buddy Rogers , who became the WWWF World Heavyweight Champion in 1963, a title that is now known as the WWE Championship .
Bruno Sammartino defeated inaugural champion Buddy Rogers and became the longest-reigning champion at 2,803 days; pictured here in his second reign with the then- WWWF Heavyweight Championship (now WWE Championship)
Triple H after winning the Undisputed WWF Championship (now WWE Championship) at WrestleMania X8 ; the former WCW Championship (left) and WWF Championship belts represented the unified title until a single belt was presented to Triple H in April 2002; later that same year in September, Triple H became the inaugural World Heavyweight Champion (original) , which also used the Big Gold Belt design that had represented the WCW Championship.
Randy Orton unified the World Heavyweight Championship (original) with the WWE Championship in December 2013, retiring the former and renaming the latter to WWE World Heavyweight Championship (which reverted to WWE Championship in 2016); the two belts represented the unified title until a single belt was presented to Brock Lesnar in August 2014.
Roman Reigns with the Undisputed WWE Championship belt (known as the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship during his reign). Initially, he carried both the WWE and Universal Championship belts, but in June 2023, he was presented with a single championship belt representing both titles.
The inaugural WCW World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair
John Cena with the World Heavyweight Championship. The title was represented by a design based on the Big Gold Belt that incorporated the WWE logo.
Christian with the final belt design of the ECW Championship used in WWE
Kevin Owens with the with the original Raw version of the championship belt used from 2016 to 2019
One-time champion Aleister Black with the 2017–2022 version of the championship belt
The inaugural World Heavyweight Champion Seth "Freakin" Rollins . Rollins was also the inaugural NXT Champion and is the only wrestler to have held the NXT, WWE, Universal , and World Heavyweight Championships