TNA World Championship

, pictured here with the TNA World Championship (right hand) TNA Wrestling was formed as NWA: Total Nonstop Action in May 2002. Later that same year, TNA was granted control over the NWA World Heavyweight and World Tag Team Championships by the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) governing body; subsequently becoming an official NWA territory as NWA-TNA. On June 19, 2002, NWA-TNA held its first show; a weekly pay-per-view event. The main event of the telecast was a twenty-man Gauntlet for the Gold match in which 20 men sought to throw each other over the top rope and down to the floor in order to eliminate others, until there were two men left who wrestle a standard singles match to become the first ever TNA-era NWA World Heavyweight Champion. On the card, Cage was scheduled to defend the NWA World Heavyweight Championship against Kurt Angle and Sting in a three-way match. Angle defeated Cage and Sting to win the World Heavyweight Championship. During subsequent TV tapings for the next two episodes of Impact!, TNA did not acknowledge the NWA ending their agreement with TNA but gave a storyline explanation as to why a new championship was created. and scheduled a King of the Mountain match for the championship at TNA's Slammiversary on June 17, 2007. This match type involves five participants racing to gain a pinfall or submission to become eligible to hang a championship belt to win. The five participants for the King of the Mountain match were determined in a series of standard wrestling matches that took place on Impact! leading up to the event, with Angle defeating Rhino in the first bout to gain entry on the May 17 episode of Impact!. On the May 24 episode of Impact!, Samoa Joe defeated Sting to become the second participant. The third qualification match was held on the May 31 episode of Impact! between A.J. Styles and Tomko, which Styles won. The next bout pitted Chris Harris against James Storm on the June 7 episode Impact!, which ended in a double disqualification, therefore neither man advanced to the King of the Mountain match. The final qualification match was won by Christian Cage over Abyss on the June 14 episode of Impact!. Angle ended up winning the King of the Mountain match at Slammiversary over Joe, Cage, Styles and Harris, who was a mystery participant chosen by Cornette, to become the "undisputed TNA World Heavyweight Champion". Re-branding In early 2017 After TNA rebranded as Impact Wrestling, the name of its flagship show, the TNA World Heavyweight Championship changed its name to the Impact Wrestling World Heavyweight Championship to reflect the name changes of the company. At Slammiversary XV, GFW Global Champion Alberto El Patron defeated Impact Wrestling World Heavyweight Champion Bobby Lashley to unify the titles, with the GFW Global Championship being dropped and the Impact World Heavyweight Championship changing its name to the Unified GFW World Championship as Impact Wrestling began rebranding once again as GFW. In September 2017, GFW reverted their branding to Impact Wrestling, the championship then became known as the Impact Global Championship. On the February 1, 2018 episode of Impact!, the title became known as the Impact World Championship. On June 4, 2018, the title was unified with the Impact Grand Championship, with the latter title being officially retired. At Rebellion, Moose appeared with the old TNA World Heavyweight Championship belt (its 3rd design from 2011 to 2017, later modified with a white strap) and declared himself the new TNA World Heavyweight Champion after defeating Hernandez and Michael Elgin in a triple threat match, which was originally to be for the Impact World Championship but reigning champion Tessa Blanchard missed the tapings due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While the title was not recognized as an official championship by Impact, Moose had several title defenses. On the February 23, 2021, episode of Impact!, Executive Vice President Scott D’Amore officially sanctioned Moose's self-proclaimed championship. At Sacrifice, Impact World Champion Rich Swann defeated Moose to unify the championships. The TNA title was deactivated, and the Impact World Championship was briefly referred to as the Impact Unified World Championship. Return to TNA name As Impact Wrestling returned to its original name, TNA Wrestling, the world title also reverted back to its original name. It has been known as the TNA World Championship ever since. ==Championship Tournaments==

TNA World Heavyweight Championship Tournament (2010) On the August 19, 2010, edition of TNA Impact!, the TNA World Heavyweight Championship was vacated, after champion Rob Van Dam suffered a storyline injury. The title was put up in a tournament featuring the top eight ranked wrestlers in the TNA Championship Committee rankings. The finals of the tournament would take place at Bound for Glory on October 10. * Angle and Hardy wrestled another draw on the September 16 edition of Impact!, which led to Eric Bischoff making the final match at Bound for Glory a three–way. TNA World Heavyweight Championship Tournament (2013) On October 29, 2013, TNA President Dixie Carter vacated the TNA World Heavyweight Championship after the previous champion A.J. Styles. Carter scheduled an eight-man tournament to determine a new champion, that would begin on November 7. Seven of the eight men were former TNA World Heavyweight Champions including Jeff Hardy, Chris Sabin, Bobby Roode, James Storm, Kurt Angle, Austin Aries, and Samoa Joe. The eighth would be determined later in the night in a gauntlet match, which was eventually won by Magnus last eliminating Kazarian and Sting. Match stipulations for the tournament were determined by spinning the "Wheel of Dixie"; options included a Falls Count Anywhere match, a Bull Rope match, a Submission match, a Ladder match, a Full Metal Mayhem match, a Coalminer's Glove match, a Tables match, a Dixieland match, a Tuxedo match, and Last Man Standing match. The Storm/Roode match was originally a Bull Rope match but Storm asked Carter to change it to a Florida Death match, which was not on the "Wheel of Dixie", which Carter agreed to. Also, the winner would be decided at TNA Final Resolution of 2013. == Championship belt designs ==

TNA Champion Sting.jpg|Sting with the original TNA World Heavyweight Championship title belt design. File:NewJeffHardy1.JPG|Jeff Hardy with his custom design, dubbed the "Immortal Championship", which would later officially become the second title belt design after being used by Mr. Anderson and Sting. File:TNA Champion Matt Hardy.jpg|Matt Hardy with the third title belt design (2011–2017). File:Alberto El Patron at Slammiversary XV.jpg|Alberto El Patrón with the fourth title belt design, after the company was renamed "Global Force Wrestling". File:Eli Drake BFG 17 Global Champ (cropped).jpg|Eli Drake with a modified version of the fourth title belt design; which added an "Impact Wrestling" plate to the title belt to cover the Global Force Wrestling logo after the company's brief use of that name. File:Johnny Impact Feb 2019-2.jpg|Johnny Impact with the fifth design of the belt, introduced in 2018, in its original blue-painted version. File:Moose Impact World Champion (cropped).jpg|Moose with the fifth design of the belt in the red-painted version introduced in 2020. File:Joe Hendry 042025.jpg| Joe Hendry with the sixth design of the belt, introduced in January 2024 when the company rebranded back to TNA Wrestling. To date, the championship has had seven belt designs, with the original title belt (which was unveiled in May 2007) having on its center plate an imprint of an eagle with its wings extended. The word "World" was placed above the eagle's head on a ribbon. The ribbon was wrapped around the bird's wings and body. Five stars were engraved on the ribbon when it passed over each of the bird's wings and the word "Champion" as it passed over the bird's talons. The words "Heavyweight Wrestling" were printed across the bird's chest. At the top of the center plate there was TNA logo. Four smaller side plates had an imprint of a globe centered with TNA's logo at the top and bottom of each. At each end of the title belt there was a small plate that covered the championship belt snaps with TNA's logo engraved on each. At the November 8, 2010 tapings of the November 11 episode of Impact!, TNA introduced a new design for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship belt, which the champion Jeff Hardy dubbed the "Immortal Championship", as part of the Immortal storyline. The new design consisted of a purple strap with a silver center plate depicting a masked head (designed to resemble Hardy's face with face paint), the TNA logo on the forehead and blue lines along the mask. There were four irregular dodecagonal side plates on the title belt, shaped like stars with rounded edges on two of the sides of these plates. The Immortal title belt was replaced by the third design of the championship belt at the March 14, 2011 tapings of the March 17 episode of Impact!, introduced by the reigning champion at the time, Sting. The design featured seven gold plates over a black leather strap. The center plate had faux diamonds aligned along its multiple rounded edges, similar to that of the Big Gold Belt. Over the center plate was a large TNA Wrestling logo and below it the words "Heavyweight Champion" engraved in silver. On each side of the center plate was a group of three smaller plates, one with a TNA logo engraved while the other two featured separate corresponding halves of a globe, on either side of the TNA logo side plate. This belt—modified with a white strap—returned in April 2020 after Moose declared himself as "TNA World Heavyweight Champion" following defeating several past TNA wrestlers, and with then-reigning Impact World Champion Tessa Blanchard being absent due to COVID-19 pandemic travel restrictions. Moose's title would remain unrecognized until February 2021, when it became officially sanctioned and recognized by Impact executive vice president Scott D'Amore. Following Slammiversary XV, both the TNA and original GFW Global Championship belts were used in tandem to represent the unification of both titles. At Destination X 2017, the GFW Global Championship belt, with an updated color scheme and Impact logos on the side plates, became the sole belt used. Following the departure of Jeff Jarrett from the promotion, the company reverted to the Impact Wrestling name and the title belt was updated with an Impact name plate to reflect the change. A new title design was introduced at Impact Wrestling's Redemption on April 22, 2018. The gold center plate has the Impact logo with "World Champion" inscribed below the logo. An owl sits above the Impact logo, representing Impact's parent company Anthem Sports & Entertainment. On each side of the center plate is a group of four smaller gold plates, with the inner side plates featuring separate corresponding halves of a globe with "World" inscribed above the globes and "Champion" inscribed below them and the outer side plates featuring the Impact logo but without the owl design. Blue shading had filled the Impact logo, the owl design, and the globes and logos on the side plates, but in 2020, the belt was modified with red shading replacing the previous blue to reflect the new color of the Impact Wrestling logo introduced following the move to AXS TV. At Sacrifice on March 13, 2021, Impact World Champion Rich Swann defeated TNA World Heavyweight Champion Moose to unify the two championships. Following this, the 2020 red shaded Impact belt and the white strapped TNA belt were used jointly to represent the unified world championship; the unified title was briefly referred to as the Impact Unified World Championship before reverting to being called the Impact World Championship, though still represented by both belts (with the white strap TNA belt being swapped out for the original black strap version shortly thereafter). In August 2021, after Christian Cage won the title, the TNA belt was retired once again. Prior to Hard to Kill in January 2024, the company reverted back to the TNA name. To reflect the change, TNA President Scott D’Amore presented Alex Shelley, who was the last champion under the Impact name with a new belt. The new belt has 5 gold plates. The center plate added more height with the top and bottom each pointed like a V-shape with the sides having various shapes. In the center plate, features World on top, the TNA logo over a gold and red globe in center and Champion at the bottom. The first side plate next to the center on each side features World Champion in smaller print and globe in the center. The second side plate on each side is gold with TNA logo in the center. The third side plate on the right side features the Anthem logo in gold and red. == Reigns ==

Overall, there have been 65 reigns shared among 39 wrestlers. The inaugural champion was Kurt Angle, who won the title by defeating Christian Cage and Sting in a three-way match on May 13, 2007, at TNA's Sacrifice event. Angle also holds the record for the most reigns, at six. Mike Santana is the current champion in his second reign. He defeated Frankie Kazarian on Thursday Night Impact!'s AMC debut on January 15, 2026, in Garland, Texas. == See also ==