Although there are some caveats, two of the best MMA fighters of all time in Jon Jones and Jose Aldo top the list of youngest ever UFC champions.
While it's interesting that he also became part of the
list of oldest champions in UFC history, Jon Jones is credited as the youngest UFC champion in history. There are some noteworty situations and technicalities that led him to officially top that list though.
Here, we’ll look at all those details, along with the rest of Jones and Aldo’s peers, who won UFC titles at such a young age.
Related:
Jon Jones, Alex Pereira and the 15 oldest UFC champions ever
The youngest champions in UFC history
It’s worth noting how the evolution of the sport really seems to have mattered a lot in this achievement, as the list of 10 youngest ever UFC champions are filled with legends from a different era.
While the fighters at the very top are major outliers, most of those listed are also very close in age. We’ll start this list with a couple of honorable mentions, who just narrowly missed the top 10 by a couple of months.
Honorable mentions: Rose Namajunas and Cody Garbrandt
Rose Namajunas was 25 years, 4 months and 6 days old when she won her first title. Cody Garbrandt was 25 years, 5 months and 23 days old.
Garbrandt beat Dominick Cruz to take his UFC bantamweight title in 2016. He didn’t get to keep his title long, as he lost to T.J. Dillashaw less than a year later on his very next fight.
Namajunas, on the other hand, won the UFC strawweight belt by upsetting Joanna Jedrzejczyk in 2017. She lost the belt against Jessica Adrade in 2019, before regaining it in 2021 against Weili Zhang to become a two-time UFC champion at age 28.
Rose Namajunas would only miss the top 10 by 46 days.
10. Tito Ortiz
Won UFC title at age of 25 years, 2 months, 22 days.
Officially kicking off the list is UFC Hall of Famer Tito Ortiz, who scored his first of six title wins back in 2000, when he won the vacant light heavyweight title against Wanderlei Silva at UFC 25. He would then go on a dominant streak of five title defenses, where he ended up helping grow the sport as one of the UFC’s first ever mainstream stars.
His championship run ended in an upset against Randy Couture in 2003, and Ortiz would fail to recapture the title after his second KO loss to Chuck Liddell in 2006.
9. B.J. Penn
Won UFC title at age of 25 years, 1 month, 18 days.
Another UFC Hall of Famer is on this list, with B.J. Penn being nicknamed “The Prodigy” for good reason. As one of the fastest to earn a BJJ black belt, Penn entered the UFC as a 22-year-old jiu-jitsu world champion, but immediately showed a well-rounded game with three straight first round knockouts.
His first lightweight title fight was at age 23, which could’ve put him on the top of this list, but Penn would end up losing to Jens Pulver by majority decision. Pulver was among the youngest UFC champions himself, being the inaugural UFC lightweight champ at age 26.
B.J. Penn’s first UFC title win interestingly came at a higher division instead, when he submitted welterweight great Matt Hughes in 2004 at 25 years old. He would eventually win the UFC lightweight belt and become a two-division champion in 2008.
8. Ricco Rodriguez
Won UFC title at age of 25 years, 1 month, 8 days.
Ricco Rodriguez comes in at number seven, being just 10 days younger than B.J. Penn when he won the belt in 2002. After starting his MMA career as a 21 year old ADCC champion, he would compete in PRIDE and UFC before eventually stopping Randy Couture four years later to win the UFC heavyweight title.
He would become the second youngest UFC heavyweight champion at the time, and third youngest ever.
After dropping his next fights to champions like Tim Sylvia, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and Pedro Rizzo, Rodriguez would continue to have over 80 fights in his career, competing for about two decades in dozens of smaller organizations.
Frank Mir talking to Joe Rogan when he first won the UFC title in 2004
7. Frank Mir
Won UFC title at age of 25 years, 26 days.
Frank Mir joined the UFC as a 22-year-old, and quickly burst out of the scene with an aggressive submission game at heavyweight. He stopped the likes of Tank Abbott and Wes Sims, before earning a title shot and pulling off an iconic and equally gruesome armbar that broke Tim Sylvia’s forearm in 2004.
Mir would become 8-1 and the second youngest UFC heavyweight champion ever, but that momentum and his reign quickly came to an end when a serious motorcycle accident got him sidelined for two years.
He was badly stopped in two of his first three fights back from injury, but would eventually return to form years later. In 2008, Frank Mir pulled off highlight reel wins over Brock Lesnar and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, which won him the interim UFC heavyweight title at age 29.
Cover of Frank Shamrock's book Uncaged.
6. Frank Shamrock
Won UFC title at age of 25 years, 13 days.
After several fights as an MMA star in Pancrase and other Japanese promotions, Frank Shamrock made his UFC debut straight into a title fight during the UFC’s first ever event in Japan.
He armbarred Kevin Jackson in just 16 seconds, winning the inaugural UFC light heavyweight title and becoming the youngest ever champion at the time. Showing a rare, well-rounded game during that era, Frank Shamrock would go on to defend the title four times, including a Fight of the Year win over Tito Ortiz in his final UFC fight in 1999. After leaving the UFC, Shamrock also won belts in the WEC and Strikeforce.
Those achievements alone deserve a slot at the UFC Hall of Fame, but his longstanding – and petty – beef with Dana White has infamously prevented this from happening even decades later.
5th youngest UFC champion: Max Holloway
Won interim UFC title at age of 25 years, 6 days.
After making his UFC debut at just 20 years old, Max Holloway pretty much grew up in the promotion and had 15 fights before getting his first crack at a title. He won the interim UFC featherweight belt against Anthony Pettis in 2016, which kicked off his dominant reign at featherweight.
This list includes all UFC interim champions. If it didn’t, it would mean that Holloway’s reign would only start a few months after this, when he unified the belts and beat Jose Aldo in 2017. Holloway was at the age of 25 years, 5 months, and 30 days then, which would make him miss the top 10 completely and be ranked behind even both Namajunas and Garbrandt.
4th youngest UFC champion: Carlos Newton
Won UFC title at age of 24 years, 8 months, 17 days.
Carlos Newton joined a one-night UFC 17 tournament back in 1998 as a 22-year-old, where he lost a back-and-forth match up with future MMA legend Dan Henderson in the finals.
After going 5-1 in PRIDE and other promotions, “The Ronin” returned to the UFC in 2001 and went directly into a welterweight title fight. He submitted Pat Miletich with a bulldog choke to win the belt at just 24 years old. He’s also remembered for celebrating that win with his Dragon Ball Z kamehameha pose.
Carlos Newton then lost his title in his infamous bout with Matt Hughes, where he locked up a triangle choke by the fence before getting slammed and KO’d. As the referee didn’t notice it initially, Hughes was also put to sleep due to the choke, and woke up being awarded the victory.
While also fighting other legends such as Renzo Gracie and Anderson Silva, perhaps equally notable was how Newton also fought for better pay and treatment of UFC fighters, as part of the class action lawsuit against the company.
3rd youngest UFC champion: Josh Barnett
Won UFC title at age of 24 years, 4 months, 12 days.
After going 9-0 with a win over Dan Severn to start his MMA career, Josh Barnett joined the UFC at just 23 years old. Aptly called the “Baby Faced Assassin” early in his career, a 24-year-old Barnett went on to stop Randy Couture in his fifth UFC fight to win the heavyweight title.
He was the youngest ever UFC champion at the time, but Barnett’s reign didn’t last as he was stripped of his belt after one of the many drug test failures he’s had in his career. After long stints in PRIDE, Strikeforce and other organizations, Barnett eventually returned to the UFC late in his career, going 3-2 from 2013 to 2016, before running into more issues with USADA.
2nd youngest UFC champion: Jose Aldo
WEC championship converted to UFC title at age of 24 years, 2 months, 1 day.
When Zuffa decided to merge their two MMA promotions, Jose Aldo’s WEC title was officially converted to the UFC belt on November 20, 2010.
Although Jose Aldo was long considered as the best featherweight in the world, his UFC reign technically only started on that date. More of that will be discussed below, but despite these technicalities, it still made Aldo the youngest ever UFC champion at the time, albeit briefly.
The man topping this list would go on to officially break Aldo’s record just four months later.
1. Officially the youngest UFC champion in history: Jon Jones
Jon Jones is credited as the youngest UFC champion ever, winning the UFC title at age of 23 years, 8 months.
Apart from being widely known for being the youngest champion in UFC history, Jones unsurprisingly had an insanely fast start to his career as well. Jones went 6-0 in the regional scene in just 3 months. Less than a year into his career, Jones was already 8-0 with two wins in the UFC, including the highlight reel suplexes over Stephan Bonnar.
In his 8th UFC bout, Jon stopped UFC and PRIDE legend Shogun Rua in 2011, to win the title and set the record as the youngest champion at 23 years and 8 months old.
15 title fights and over a decade later, Jones firmly established himself as an all-time MMA great. After becoming heavyweight champion late in his career, it’s also impressive how Jones is the only one included in both lists of youngest and oldest champions of all time.
Bonus: Jose Aldo WEC
Won WEC title at age of 23 years, 2 months, 9 days.
Speaking of these two UFC champions constantly mentioned in MMA’s greatest of all time debates, it’s worth pointing out that Jon Jones officially topped this list because of the arbitrary date when Zuffa decided to rename the WEC titles to UFC.
While everyone else made it to this list on the date they won the championship, Jose Aldo’s UFC reign only technically started during the announcement that his belt was being converted. When he originally won the same exact title, under the same company, Jose Aldo was actually six months younger than Jon Jones’ record.
Zuffa already had a stranglehold on the sport back then, with WEC’s bantamweight and featherweight champions largely recognized as the best in the world, as were the title holders in UFC’s lightweight to heavyweight divisions. Unfortunately for record keeping purposes, Jose Aldo and Dominick Cruz’s UFC championship resumes only started when Zuffa officially moved their weight classes.
Aldo is already credited with the most championship wins in UFC featherweight history. Those record eight title wins would’ve been 11 though, if they didn’t ignore the WEC bouts he had in the same championship run.
At the end of the day, even if he first won that title by beating Mike Brown at 23 years and 2 months old, Aldo still officially ends up as the second youngest ever UFC champion.
Scott Ferrozzo vs. Vitor Belfort at UFC 12
Bonus: Vitor Belfort, youngest UFC tournament champion ever
UFC tournament champion at age of 19 years, 10 months, 6 days.
As another bonus to this list, it’s worth pointing out that it wasn’t just Jose Aldo who won championships that aren’t eligible for this list.
Vitor Belfort took just two minutes to beat two opponents in one day, as he won a UFC heavyweight tournament back in 1997. He earned the nickname “The Phenom” and became a tournament champion at just 19 years old.
Unfortunately, that UFC 12 tournament win doesn’t count as an official UFC title. The inaugural belt was actually crowned on the same card, where UFC 11 tournament winner Mark Coleman beat “superfight champion” Dan Severn to become the first ever official UFC heavyweight champion.
In 2004, a 26-year-old Belfort would eventually win an official UFC title, when he won the light heavyweight belt after causing a cut to Randy Couture’s eyelid.
Who is the current youngest UFC champion?
At 27 years old, Ilia Topuria is by far the youngest among the UFC champions today.
Ilia Topuria is a few years younger than the other active UFC champions, but where does he rank among the youngest in history? Interestingly enough, even if he won the title at just 27 years and 27 days old, he still doesn’t even crack the top 15 of this list.
As a testament to his longevity, Topuria’s UFC 308 opponent in Max Holloway did make it to this list after his UFC title win eight years ago.
Can the youngest UFC fighters today break Jon Jones’ record?
Based on the current crop of prospects, it seems highly unlikely that anyone can become UFC champion younger than Jon Jones or even Jose Aldo.
Everyone listed here in the top 10 are from a much older generation, except for Holloway, who joined the UFC at age 20 and only qualified as an interim champion at 25. As noted above, Topuria, the youngest champion today, didn’t even come close to making the list.
Perhaps it speaks to how much the sport has evolved and how hard it is to climb the ladder in this era, but no one else has made it into this list in the last 13 years.
It’s unclear if things can change soon, but the youngest UFC fighters today include Raul Rosas Jr. (20) and Rei Tsuruya (22). Although they technically still have some time, they’re both a long way from even becoming ranked contenders, let alone being crowned champion.
Muhammad Mokaev was actually highly ranked, but the undefeated prospect’s contract wasn’t renewed after
a dispute
with UFC matchmakers, and he’s now 24.
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