Stephanie Vaquer Tops the 2026 PWI Women's 250: Full Top 10, Her Year in Numbers and Whether She Deserved It
Stephanie Vaquer is the No. 1 woman in the 2026 PWI Women's 250. Pro Wrestling Illustrated revealed its annual list on November 12, and Vaquer finished ahead of AEW's Willow Nightingale and Stardom's Thekla in the top three.
She is one of three WWE women in the top 10, with Liv Morgan at No. 6 and Rhea Ripley at No. 9. Last year's No. 1, Mercedes Moné, drops to fourth.
The 2026 PWI Women's 250 top 10
| Rank | Wrestler |
|---|---|
| 1 | Stephanie Vaquer |
| 2 | Willow Nightingale |
| 3 | Thekla |
| 4 | Mercedes Moné |
| 5 | Saya Kamitani |
| 6 | Liv Morgan |
| 7 | Persephone |
| 8 | Syuri |
| 9 | Rhea Ripley |
| 10 | Kris Statlander |
The ranking covers October 1, 2025, to September 30, 2026. PWI judges wrestlers on in-ring achievement, influence, technical ability, the level of competition and how active they were.
Vaquer's year, by the numbers
Vaquer went into the window as Women's World Champion. She won the vacant title by beating IYO SKY at Wrestlepalooza on September 20, 2025, and held it for 210 days, until Liv Morgan beat her on Night One of WrestleMania 42 on April 18.
In between, she beat Tiffany Stratton for the Women's Crown Jewel Championship at Crown Jewel in October 2025 and kept her world title against Nikki Bella at Survivor Series in November. After WrestleMania she was out until August, came back with a win over Roxanne Perez on Raw, and won the Women's World Championship back from Morgan at a live event in Santiago, Chile, on September 12, with Becky Lynch as the special guest referee.
| Wins | Losses | Draws | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Raw and SmackDown | 9 | 2 | 1 |
| Premium Live Events | 2 | 1 | 0 |
| Total | 11 | 3 | 1 |
Two numbers stand out: 210 days as champion, and only 15 televised matches in twelve months. Both say a lot about how she got to No. 1.
Our take: is Vaquer the right No. 1?
Mostly, yes. For the first half of the window, Vaquer was the clear top woman on Raw. She was the champion, she beat a former WWE Women's Champion and a Hall of Famer on Premium Live Events, and her matches were among the most consistent on the show. If you were picking the best wrestler in WWE's women's division from October to March, she would be the easy answer.
The case against her is activity, and it is a fair one. Fifteen televised matches is a light year for a world champion, and she missed most of the spring and summer. PWI lists activity as one of its five criteria, and on that one alone she would not be near the top. Her ranking only works if you weigh what she did when she was there far more heavily than how often she was there.
We think that is the right call for a list like this. A world champion who carries the title through two Premium Live Events and the build to WrestleMania has done more than someone who simply wrestled more often. Even so, a No. 1 built on six strong months is easier to argue with than most.
Rhea Ripley at No. 9 is too low
If any WWE ranking on this list is off, it is Ripley's. In the same window she wrestled 27 times on TV and Premium Live Events and won 20 of them, five of those at Premium Live Events. She held the WWE Women's Championship for 105 days after WrestleMania 42 and the Women's Tag Team Championship earlier in the year.
| PWI rank | Matches | Wins | PLE wins | Title days in the window | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stephanie Vaquer | 1 | 15 | 11 | 2 | 217 |
| Liv Morgan | 6 | 15 | 9 | 3 | 147 |
| Rhea Ripley | 9 | 27 | 20 | 5 | 158 |
Title days count world, women's and tag title reigns inside the window only, not including Vaquer's Crown Jewel Championship. On every measure that is not about the very top of the card, Ripley had the strongest year of the three. Ranking her below Morgan is hard to explain from the record.
Liv Morgan at No. 6 is about right
Morgan's year was built on one result: beating Vaquer for the Women's World Championship at WrestleMania 42. She then held the title for 147 days, until Vaquer won it back in Chile. Her nine wins from 15 matches are not dominant, but she was the champion for most of the second half of the window and the centre of Raw's women's division for most of the year. Sixth feels fair.
Who is missing from the top 10
Tiffany Stratton, IYO SKY and Jade Cargill are not in the top 10, and the numbers explain why. Stratton won 12 and lost 17 on TV and Premium Live Events in the window, with four of her five PLE matches ending in defeat. Cargill went 16–3 on TV but lost all four of her PLE matches. SKY had a solid year, 18 wins from 31 matches, but no long title run.
The bigger point is that WWE has three women in the top 10 and AEW, Stardom and other promotions have the other seven. For a company with WWE's resources, that is a modest return, and it reflects how few women's matches get real time on Raw and SmackDown.
What it means for Vaquer now
The timing is odd. Vaquer is the top-ranked woman in wrestling, but she is not the champion and she is not on the Survivor Series card. She lost the title back to Morgan at Money in the Bank in October, then missed time with an ankle injury and an illness. Dave Meltzer reported on Wrestling Observer Radio this week that she is healthy and cleared, and she has been winning at live events, but there is no date for her return to TV. Our Vaquer status update has the details.
Meanwhile, Morgan defends the Women's World Championship against Becky Lynch at Survivor Series on November 28. Whoever leaves Houston with the title, the obvious next challenger is the woman PWI just named the best in the world. If WWE wants to use this ranking, a Vaquer return in the weeks after Survivor Series, aimed straight at the title, is the way to do it.
See Vaquer's full record and title history on her profile, and compare her with Morgan or Ripley using our Compare tool.
Source: Pro Wrestling Illustrated.
