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WORLD Boxing has published its latest rankings for elite men and women: https://worldboxing.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/World-Boxing-Ranking-2026-July.pdf.

The rankings, which cover performances from July 2024 – June 2026, have been updated to include the recent ‘World Boxing Cup: China 2026 – Guiyang City’ which has seen a number of boxers make progress following their success at the tournament.

In the women’s categories, Kazakhstan’s Viktoriya Grafeyeva has entered the top three at lightweight (W60kg)after her gold in China, while Ziyi Bao has gone from three to two after her middleweight (W75kg) win at home. A silver medal in Guiyang City has seen England’s Sacha Hickey move from eight to six at welterweight(W65kg), while China’s Liu Yang, has jumped six places from 14 to eight at light-middleweight (W70kg), thanks to her gold at the same tournament.

The main movers in the men’s weights are three boxers that won silver medals at the most recent World Boxing Cup. At light-middleweight (M70kg), India’s Deepak Deepak has gone from 12 to nine; at heavyweight, England’s Isaac Okoh has moved up two places to number eight in the world; and at super-heavyweight Nikita Putilov of Germany has risen from 16 to 12.

Six boxers consolidated their position at the top of the rankings with gold medals in Guiyang City. They included Paris 2024 gold medallist, Wu Yu of China (W51kg), Kazakhstan’s 2025 World Boxing Champions, Sanzhar Tashkenbay (M50kg) and Aibek Oralbay (M90kg+) and Abdumalik Khalokov (M60kg), JavokhirUmmataliev (M80kg) and Turabek Khabibillaev (M90kg) of Uzbekistan.

The new rankings are the fifth set published by World Boxing with points being awarded for performances at the Olympic Games, World Boxing Cups, World Boxing Championships, Continental Championships, Continental Multi-Sport Games and the World Boxing Cup Finals.

The rankings are used for seeding boxers at competitions with the points issued on a three-year cycle. Boxers may not accumulate ranking points from more than four competitions at a given time.

The next ranking event of 2026 will be the European Boxing Championships in Sofia, 15 – 26 September 2026followed by The Asian Games in Aichi/Nagoya, 19 September – 4 October 2026.

World Boxing’s competition calendar for 2026 can be viewed HERE.

World Boxing has increased its membership to 89 countries after its Executive Board approved the applications of five more boxing National Federations.

The five new members are: the Bulgarian Boxing Federation, the Ghana Boxing Federation, the Sierra Leone Boxing Federation, the World Boxing Federation of the Bahamas and the Albania Boxing Federation.

The approval of the applications follows the recent decision by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to grant provisional recognition to World Boxing (25 February 2025) and its subsequent confirmation (20 March 2025) that boxing has been restored to the sport programme for LA28.

All of the new National Federations have completed a rigorous application process to join World Boxing. They are deemed to be in good standing and, through their statutes and operating processes, able to demonstrate a transparent and open election process, the existence and operation of WADA-recognised anti-doping polices and processes, evidence of independent, structured, dispute resolution and appeals processes, formal recognition by either their National Olympic Committee (NOC) or Ministry for Sport and a solid national and international boxing programme.

The additions of the National Federations for boxing Ghana and Sierra Leone increases World Boxing’s representation in Africa where it now has nine members.

The President of World Boxing, Boris van der Vorst, said: “After the recent confirmation that boxing will be part of the programme for LA28, the announcement of five more members, including two from Africa, is more great news for World Boxing as we go from strength to strength and continue to grow our global footprint.

“It is clear that the future of boxing as an Olympic sport lies with World Boxing.  The continued growth of our membership is further evidence of the widespread support that exists for our vision of the sport and an expression of confidence in World Boxing’s ability to deliver a better future for boxing that puts the interest of boxers at the heart of decision making.” 

Under World Boxing’s Statutes, the approval of the Executive Board means the five new National Federations have been endorsed for membership.  Final approval of membership status can only be conferred by Congress, which is the ultimate authority of World Boxing, and will be voted on at the next Congress in New Delhi in November 2025.

World Boxing was launched in April 2023 with a mission to ensure that boxing remains at the heart of the Olympic movement.

It held its first formal meeting with the IOC in May 2024 and on 25 February 2025, it was granted provisional recognition by the IOC as the International Federation (IF) within the Olympic Movement governing the sport of boxing at world level.