Most Sumo Championships in History: All-Time Yūshō Leaders

🏆 What Is a Yūshō (Championship)?

A yūshō (優勝) is the championship of a grand sumo tournament. Six tournaments (honbasho) are held every year, each lasting 15 days, and the wrestler in the top makuuchi division with the best win–loss record is crowned champion and lifts the Emperor's Cup. A perfect 15–0 championship is called a zenshō-yūshō.

Because there are only six chances a year — and the top division is brutally competitive — championships are the single most respected measure of a wrestler's career. The official championship system dates to 1909, which is why every wrestler on the ranking below is compared on the same footing. Curious when the next one is decided? See the 2026 tournament schedule.

🏅 The All-Time Yūshō Leaders

These ten wrestlers have won the most top-division championships in the official history of sumo. Six of them cleared 20 titles — an achievement only the truly generational reach.

#1 🥇 Hakuhō Shō — 45 Championships

Born: March 11, 1985, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Stable: Miyagino.

Hakuhō is the most decorated wrestler in the recorded history of sumo, and the gap is enormous. His 45 top-division championships are 41% clear of Taihō's previous record of 32 — the equivalent of breaking a long-standing home-run record by more than a dozen. Along the way he set the all-time mark for consecutive victories (63), won at least one championship in 15 straight years, and spent more than a decade as the sport's undisputed number one.

What made him special was not size but precision: a textbook right-hand-inside (migi-yotsu) technician whose balance and timing simply outclassed everyone else. Read his full career profile for the complete records.

#2 🥈 Taihō Kōki — 32 Championships

Born: 1940, Hokkaidō (of Japanese–Ukrainian heritage). Died: 2013.

Taihō defined sumo's post-war golden age. His 32 championships stood as the untouchable record for over four decades until Hakuhō surpassed it. He twice won six tournaments in a row and was so beloved that the phrase “Kyojin, Taihō, tamagoyaki” (the Giants baseball team, Taihō, and rolled omelette) became shorthand for everything Japanese children loved in the 1960s.

#3 🥉 Chiyonofuji Mitsugu — 31 Championships

Born: 1955, Hokkaidō. Died: 2016.

Nicknamed “The Wolf” for his piercing stare and lean, muscular frame, Chiyonofuji won 31 championships despite being far smaller than his rivals. He overcame a chronically dislocating shoulder by building extraordinary grip strength, then reeled off a 53-bout winning streak. He remains, for many fans, the most charismatic champion the sport has produced — read his full profile.

#4 Asashōryū Akinori — 25 Championships

Born: 1980, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

Asashōryū was the first Mongolian yokozuna and the most dominant wrestler of the 2000s, with 25 championships. In 2005 he won all six tournaments in a single calendar year — a feat no one had ever managed. His fiery, emotional style thrilled fans and unsettled traditionalists in equal measure; see his full profile.

#5 Kitanoumi Toshimitsu — 24 Championships

Born: 1953, Hokkaidō. Died: 2015.

Kitanoumi became the youngest yokozuna in history at 21 years and 2 months, then bullied the field into submission through the late 1970s for 24 championships. Feared for his sheer power and refusal to give an inch, he later served as chairman of the Japan Sumo Association.

#6 Takanohana Kōji — 22 Championships

Born: 1972, Tokyo.

The face of the 1990s “Waka–Taka” boom that sent sumo's popularity soaring, Takanohana won 22 championships and formed one of the sport's greatest rivalries with the towering Hawaiian yokozuna Akebono. He came from a famous sumo family and carried immense national expectation from a young age.

#7 Wajima Hiroshi — 14 Championships

Born: 1948, Ishikawa.

Wajima remains the only wrestler to reach yokozuna after a university sumo career rather than joining a stable as a teenager. His devastating left-hand grip — the “golden left” — carried him to 14 championships through the 1970s in a fierce rivalry with Kitanoumi that fans dubbed the “Rin–Ko era.”

#8 Futabayama Sadaji — 12 Championships

Born: 1912, Ōita. Died: 1968.

Futabayama's 69-consecutive-bout winning streak (1936–1939) is the greatest record in sumo history and has never been seriously approached. Remarkably, he achieved it while effectively blind in his right eye. His 12 championships came in an era of only two tournaments per year — meaning far fewer chances to win than modern wrestlers get. See his full profile.

#8 Musashimaru Kōyō — 12 Championships

Born: 1912, Ōita. Died: 1968.

Futabayama's 69-consecutive-bout winning streak (1936–1939) is the greatest record in sumo history and has never been seriously approached. Remarkably, he achieved it while effectively blind in his right eye. His 12 championships came in an era of only two tournaments per year — meaning far fewer chances to win than modern wrestlers get. See his full profile.

#10 Akebono Tarō — 11 Championships

Born: 1969, Hawaii. Died: April 2024.

At 203 cm, Akebono was the first foreign-born wrestler to reach yokozuna (1993), breaking a barrier many thought permanent. His 11 championships and his epic battles with Takanohana defined the 1990s; he later carried the Olympic-style spotlight into a second career and remains a beloved pioneering figure.

📜 Before 1909: The Unofficial Era

You will sometimes see even bigger numbers attached to legendary names from the Edo period — but they come with an honest asterisk. Before the modern championship system began in 1909, there was no official yūshō, and titles are assigned retrospectively from incomplete records.

• Raiden Tameemon (c. 1790–1810) is credited with the best record in roughly 28 tournaments and an estimated career win rate near 96% — arguably the most dominant wrestler who ever lived, though he was famously never promoted to yokozuna.
• Tanikaze Kajinosuke is credited with about 21, and Kashiwado Risuke with around 16, in the same unofficial era.

These figures are historically fascinating but cannot be directly compared to the official-era totals above, so we list them separately rather than mixing eras.

⚡ Active Leaders Chasing the Record

No active wrestler is close to the all-time list yet — but every tournament rewrites the numbers. As of July 2026, the active leader is:

Ōnosato, promoted to the 75th yokozuna, has become the sport's fastest-rising champion and already leads all active wrestlers. Mongolian yokozuna Hōshōryū — nephew of the great Asashōryū — follows. Both counts grow with each basho; you can follow live results and every Futagoyama-stable bout on our English tracker.

📊 Full Comparison Table

Career championships in the official top division (makuuchi), 1909–present. Verified against Japan Sumo Association records, July 2026.

🔮 Will Hakuhō's Record Ever Be Broken?

Here is the maths that makes 45 so daunting. With six tournaments a year, a wrestler would need to win every single championship for seven and a half straight years just to reach it from zero — with no injuries, no off-tournaments, and no rivals catching fire. Even Hakuhō, at his most dominant, did not win them all; he simply stayed elite for an astonishingly long time.

The modern game makes it harder still. The talent pool is deeper and more international than ever, sports science has narrowed the gap between the very best and the merely excellent, and top wrestlers now retire earlier to protect their bodies. A generational talent like Ōnosato could realistically chase 20 or even 30 — but 45 may stand as sumo's equivalent of an unbreakable record for a very long time.

For the fuller debate on greatness beyond raw titles, see our ranking of the greatest sumo wrestlers of all time.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

🔗 Keep Exploring

• The Greatest Sumo Wrestlers of All Time — greatness beyond raw title counts.
• The Heaviest Sumo Wrestlers Ever — the record-breaking giants of the dohyō.
• Every Yokozuna in History — the complete list of grand champions.
• Live Futagoyama Stable Tracker — follow today's basho in English.