| AEW International Championship | |
| Currentholder: | MJF |
| Won: | July 17, 2024 |
| Created: | June 8, 2022 |
| Promotion: | All Elite Wrestling |
| Mostreigns: | Orange Cassidy (2 reigns) |
| Longestreign: | Orange Cassidy (1st reign, 326 days) |
| Shortestreign: | Jon Moxley (17 days) |
| Oldest: | Roderick Strong |
| Youngest: | MJF |
| Heaviest: | Will Ospreay |
| Lightest: | Orange Cassidy |
| Pastnames: |
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The AEW International Championship is a professional wrestling championship created and promoted by the American promotion All Elite Wrestling (AEW). It is a secondary championship for male wrestlers, and unlike AEW's other titles, which are almost exclusively defended on AEW programming, the International Championship can also be defended in other promotions globally. The current champion is MJF, who is in his first reign. He won the title by defeating Will Ospreay at Dynamite 250 on July 17, 2024; MJF subsequently unofficially rebranded the title as the AEW American Championship.
Established as the AEW All-Atlantic Championship on June 8, 2022, the title was created to represent AEW's fans from around the world with no particular focus on the Atlantic Ocean or countries surrounding it. The inaugural champion was Pac. Since its establishment, the title has been defended in the Revolution Pro Wrestling, Over the Top Wrestling, New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), and Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre promotions, although most of its defenses have occurred in AEW, which has also included defenses against wrestlers from NJPW. On March 15, 2023, the title was rebranded as the AEW International Championship.
The championship was unveiled by the American professional wrestling promotion All Elite Wrestling (AEW) on the June 8, 2022, episode of Dynamite. It was originally established as the AEW All-Atlantic Championship and was created to be a secondary title for the men's division. Despite its original name seemingly centering on countries around the Atlantic Ocean, the company announced that the championship "[represented] the AEW fans watching around the world in over 130 countries".[1]
The inaugural champion was crowned in a four-way match which was held at the Forbidden Door pay-per-view event on June 26, which was co-produced with the Japanese promotion New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). To determine the competitors in the four-way, six qualifying matches were held. Three of these featured wrestlers from AEW with the three winners advancing to the four-way match.[1] The other three qualifying matches were held between four wrestlers from NJPW in a single-elimination tournament fashion. The winners of NJPW's preliminary qualifiers faced off and the winner of that match advanced to the four-way at Forbidden Door.[2] [3] On the AEW side, Pac,[4] Miro,[5] and Malakai Black[6] won their qualifiers; on the NJPW side, Tomohiro Ishii qualified but suffered a legitimate left knee injury and had to be replaced with the runner-up, Clark Connors.[7] At Forbidden Door, Pac became the inaugural champion by submitting Connors.
In an interview with Robbie Fox on the My Mom's Basement podcast, AEW president Tony Khan confirmed that the championship would be defended differently than the company's other titles. Khan said that holders of the championship would defend the title internationally in other promotions, in addition to AEW. This interview came shortly after Pac defended the title at an event for British promotion Revolution Pro Wrestling (RevPro), which was later shown on AEW's YouTube show, Dark, on July 12.[8] Pac also defended the title at an event for Ireland's Over the Top Wrestling (OTT) promotion on July 22.[9] During Orange Cassidy's first reign in April 2023, he defended the title at an NJPW event,[10] while during his second reign in February 2024, he also made a defense at a RevPro event.[11] After MJF won the championship in July 2024, he defended the title at an event for the Mexican promotion Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) on August 2,[12] followed by a defense in RevPro on August 11.[13]
On the March 8, 2023, episode of Dynamite, Tony Khan announced that Orange Cassidy's defense of the title that night was the final as the AEW All-Atlantic Championship. The following week on March 15, in celebration of the release of the Warner Bros. film Shazam! Fury of the Gods, the title was rebranded as the AEW International Championship due to AEW's broadcast partnership with Warner Bros. Discovery.[14] At the time, AEW had considered this to be a new title, with Cassidy regarded as the final All-Atlantic Champion and inaugural International Champion,[15] but the title history was later amended to show that it was the same championship with Cassidy's reign as one continuous reign from when he originally defeated Pac for the title.[16]
During Dynamite: Blood & Guts on July 24, 2024, reigning champion MJF, who won the title from Will Ospreay at the previous week's Dynamite 250, unofficially rebranded the title as the "AEW American Championship". He also introduced his own custom version of the title belt to reflect this unofficial name change.[17]
Ron Edwardsen of Red Leather Belts designed the standard version of the championship belt. At the top of the center plate is AEW's logo, while at the center of the plate is a globe with flags representing six countries: Mexico, China, the United Kingdom (UK), the United States, Canada, and Japan. Originally, the banner above the globe read "All-Atlantic", but this was changed to "International" with the championship's rebranding on March 15, 2023. Another banner below the globe reads "Champion". On each opposing side of the globe are lions standing upright. Sitting on each side of the center plate are two side plates. The inner side plates include AEW's logo over a globe, while the outer side plates feature two wrestlers grappling. Filigree fills in the rest of each plate.[18]
During Dynamite: Blood & Guts on July 24, 2024, reigning champion MJF threw away the standard version of the championship belt. He then introduced his own custom version, which he unofficially rebranded as the AEW American Championship. It features the overall same design as the standard version, but the strap is painted like the American flag, the globe at the center was replaced by the contiguous United States, also painted like the American flag, and the upper banner reads "American" instead of "International". Additionally, the two inner side plates mock the UK, as well as UK native Will Ospreay, who MJF beat to win the title, as one side plate says "Better Than Will and the UK Knows It", a play on MJF's catchphrase of "better than you and you know it", and the other side plate says "Only Country That Matters", with the text for each written in red, white, and blue except the UK text, which is adorned as the UK flag. The grappling wrestlers on the outer side plates were also replaced by MJF himself posing, showing him kneeling on one knee and flexing his bicep. MJF's logo also replaced AEW's logo at the top of the center plate and is also placed at the top of the inner side plates. This custom belt was also designed by Ron Edwardsen.[19]
As of,, there have been eight reigns between seven champions. Pac was the inaugural champion. Orange Cassidy has the most reigns at two and his first reign is the longest reign at 326 days, while Jon Moxley has the shortest reign at 17 days. MJF is the youngest champion, winning the title at 28, while Roderick Strong is the oldest, winning the title at 40.
The current champion is MJF, who is in his first reign. He defeated Will Ospreay at Dynamite 250 on July 17, 2024, in North Little Rock, Arkansas. The following week, MJF unofficially rebranded the title as the AEW American Championship.[17]
| Name | Years | |
|---|---|---|
| AEW All-Atlantic Championship | June 8, 2022 – March 15, 2023 | |
| AEW International Championship | March 15, 2023 – present | |
| AEW American Championship | July 24, 2024 – present (Name used by MJF during his reign) |
As of, .
| † | Indicates the current champion |
|---|
| Rank | Wrestler | data-sort-type="number" | No. of reigns | data-sort-type="number" | Combined days |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 471 | |||
| 2 | 1 | 108 | |||
| 3 | 1 | 84 | |||
| 4 | 1 | 52 | |||
| 5 | MJF † | 1 | + | ||
| 6 | 1 | 20 | |||
| 7 | 1 | 17 |