The World Women Pairs Championship is a bridge championship held every four years as part of the World Bridge Championships. It is restricted to women pairs only.
World meets commonly run for 15 days on a schedule whose details vary.
In 2006 the Women Pairs played Saturday to Friday, the 8th to 14th days of the meet, with five qualifying sessions, five semifinal sessions, and four final sessions. At the start of qualifying, sixteen teams remained in the knockout stage of the marquee teams competition for women, for the McConnell Cup. During qualifying sessions for the pairs, the McConnell teams were reduced from sixteen to four, and players from the twelve "knocked out" teams were eligible to enter pairs competition at the semifinal stage. There were 109 pairs in the qualifier, 63 in the semifinal, and 36 in the final.[1]
United States pairs have won ten of 14 tournaments through 2014, Great Britain two, Netherlands one, China one. Fritzi Gordon and Rixi Markus of Great Britain (native Austrians) are the only two-time champion pair; Americans Karen McCallum and Kerri Sanborn/Shuman also have two wins each including one as partners in 1990. Sanborn is also the only winner of two gold medals in the World Mixed Pairs Championship, which is contested at the same quadrennial meet.
| Year, Site | Entries | Medalists | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1962 [2] Cannes, France | 1. | Rixi Markus | |||
| 2. |  Fanny Parienté | Marianne Serf | |||
| 3. |  Helen Portugal | ||||
| 1966 [3] Amsterdam, Netherlands | 1. | Joan Durran | Jane Juan | ||
| 2. | Sue Sachs | ||||
| 3. | Peggy Solomon | ||||
| 1970 [4] Stockholm, Sweden | 1. | Marilyn Johnson | |||
| 2. | Rixi Markus | ||||
| 3. |  Britt Blom | Gunborg Silborn | |||
| 1974 [5] Las Palmas, Spain | 1. | Rixi Markus | |||
| 2. |  Gerda Goslar | Rita Jacobson | |||
| 3. | Dorothy Hayden Truscott | ||||
| 1978 [6] New Orleans, USA | 1. | Kathie Wei | |||
| 2. | Carol Sanders | ||||
| 3. | Claude Blouquit | Élisabeth Delor | |||
| After 1980 it was determined that the world championships in even years would continue to be played in Europe and North America. | |||||
| 1982 [7] Biarritz, France | 1. | Carol Sanders | |||
| 2. | Beth Palmer | ||||
| 3. | Sandra Landy | ||||
| 1986 [8] Miami Beach, USA | 1. | Jacqui Mitchell | |||
| 2. |  Bettina Kalkerup | Charlotte Palmund | |||
| 3. | Sandra Landy | ||||
| 1990 [9] Geneva, Switzerland | 1. | Kerri Shuman | |||
| 2. | Kathie Wei | ||||
| 3. |  Carla Arnolds | Bep Vriend | |||
| 1994 [10] Albuquerque, USA | 1. | Carla Arnolds | Bep Vriend | ||
| 2. | Véronique Bessis | Catherine Saul | |||
| 3. | Beth Palmer | ||||
| 1998 [11] [12] Lille, France | 1. | Shawn Quinn | |||
| 2. |  Sabine Auken | ||||
| 3. | Véronique Bessis | Catherine D'Ovidio | |||
| 2002 [13] [14] Montreal, Canada | 97 | 1. | Debbie Rosenberg | ||
| 2. | Blandine de Hérédia | Anne-Frédérique Lévy | |||
| 3. | Kerri Sanborn | ||||
| 2006 [15] [16] Verona, Italy | 109 | 1. | Kerri Sanborn | ||
| 2. |  WANG Hongli | WANG Wenfei | |||
| 3. | Janice Seamon-Molson | ||||
| 2010 [17] [18] Philadelphia, USA | 81 | 1. | Beth Palmer | ||
| 2. |  Susan Culham | Kismet Fung | |||
| 3. | Carla Arnolds | Bep Vriend | |||
| 2014 [19] < | -- not the best source and not sufficient --> Sanya, China | 46 | 1. | Liu Shu | Zhou Tao |
| 2. | Huang Yen | Gan Lin | |||
| 3. |  Suci Amita Dewi | Kristina Wahyo Murniati | |||
| 2018 [20] Orlando, USA | 51 | 1. | Veronique Bessis | Anne-Laure Huberschwiller | |
| 2. | Kathy Sulgrove | Candace Griffey | |||
| 3. | Yan Huang | Nan Wang | |||