List of IWGP Intercontinental Champions

The IWGP Intercontinental Championship is a professional wrestling championship owned by the New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) promotion. "IWGP" is the acronym of NJPW's governing body, the International Wrestling Grand Prix.[1] On October 3, 2010, American promotion Jersey All Pro Wrestling (JAPW) announced that it had reached an agreement with NJPW for the promotion to run its first shows in the United States.[2] NJPW officially announced the tour, titled NJPW Invasion Tour 2011: Attack on East Coast, on January 4, 2011, announcing shows for May 13 in Rahway, New Jersey, May 14 in New York City and May 15 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[3][4] It was also announced that during the tour, New Japan would introduce a new "IWGP Intercontinental Championship".[3] There have been twenty-four reigns shared among fourteen wrestlers with one vacancy.Kota Ibushi is the current champion in his second reign. He won the title by defeating previous champion Tetsuya Naito on January 04, 2021 at Wrestle Kingdom 15.[5]

Two-time and current champion Kota Ibushi

Title history
Key
No. Overall reign number
Reign Reign number for the specific champion
Days Number of days held
Defenses Number of successful defenses
N/A Unknown information
+ Current reign is changing daily
No. Champion Championship change Reign statistics Notes Ref.
Date Event Location Reign DaysDefenses
1 MVP May 15, 2011 Invasion Tour 2011: Attack on
East Coast		 Philadelphia, U.S. 1 1482 Defeated Toru Yano in an eight–man tournament final to become the inaugural champion. [6]
2 Masato Tanaka October 10, 2011 Destruction '11 Tokyo, Japan 1 1253 [7]
3 Hirooki Goto February 12, 2012 The New Beginning Osaka, Japan 1 1612 [8]
4 Shinsuke Nakamura July 22, 2012 Kizuna Road Yamagata, Japan 1 3138 [9]
5 La Sombra May 31, 2013 Super Viernes Mexico City, Mexico 1 501 This was a two out of three falls match. [10][11]
6 Shinsuke Nakamura July 20, 2013 Kizuna Road Akita, Japan 2 1683 [12]
7 Hiroshi Tanahashi January 4, 2014 Wrestle Kingdom 8 in Tokyo Dome Tokyo, Japan 1 921 [13]
8 Shinsuke Nakamura April 6, 2014 Invasion Attack Tokyo, Japan 3 761 [14]
9 Bad Luck Fale June 21, 2014 Dominion 6.21 Osaka, Japan 1 920 [15]
10 Shinsuke Nakamura September 21, 2014 Destruction in Kobe Kobe, Japan 4 2243 [16]
11 Hirooki Goto May 3, 2015 Wrestling Dontaku Fukuoka, Japan 2 1471 [17]
12 Shinsuke Nakamura September 27, 2015 Destruction in Kobe Kobe, Japan 5 1202 [18]
— Vacated January 25, 2016 N/A Tokyo, Japan — —— Vacated due to Nakamura leaving NJPW for WWE. [19]
13 Kenny Omega February 14, 2016 The New Beginning in Niigata Nagaoka, Japan 1 1261 Defeated Hiroshi Tanahashi to win the vacant title. [20]
14 Michael Elgin June 19, 2016 Dominion 6.19 in Osaka-jo Hall Osaka, Japan 1 981 This was a ladder match. [21]
15 Tetsuya Naito September 25, 2016 Destruction in Kobe Kobe, Japan 1 2594 [22]
16 Hiroshi Tanahashi June 11, 2017 Dominion 6.11 in Osaka-jo Hall Osaka, Japan 2 2304 [23]
17 Minoru Suzuki January 27, 2018 The New Beginning in Sapporo Sapporo, Japan 1 921 [24]
18 Tetsuya Naito April 29, 2018 Wrestling Hinokuni Kumamoto, Japan 2 410 [25]
19 Chris Jericho June 9, 2018 Dominion 6.9 in Osaka-jo Hall Osaka, Japan 1 2091 [26]
20 Tetsuya Naito January 4, 2019 Wrestle Kingdom 13 in Tokyo Dome Tokyo, Japan 3 921 This was a no disqualification match. [27]
21 Kota Ibushi April 6, 2019 G1 Supercard New York City, U.S. 1 641 [28]
22 Tetsuya Naito June 9, 2019 Dominion 6.9 in Osaka-jo Hall Osaka, Japan 4 1050 [29]
23 Jay White September 22, 2019 Destruction in Kobe Kobe, Japan 1 1041 [30][31]
24 Tetsuya Naito January 4, 2020 Wrestle Kingdom 14 in Tokyo Dome
Night 1		 Tokyo, Japan 5 1902 [32]
25 Evil July 12, 2020 Dominion in
Osaka-jo Hall		 Osaka, Japan 1 481 Naito's IWGP Heavyweight Championship was also on the line. [33]
26 Tetsuya Naito August 29, 2020 Summer Struggle in Jingu Tokyo, Japan 6 1281 Evil's IWGP Heavyweight Championship was also on the line. [34][35]
27 Kota Ibushi January 4, 2021 Wrestle Kingdom 15 in Tokyo Dome
Night 1		 Tokyo, Japan 2 35+1 Naito's IWGP Heavyweight Championship was also on the line. [5]

Combined reigns
Record six-time champion Tetsuya Naito
Five-time champion Shinsuke Nakamura, who holds the record for the longest reign at 313 days and longest combined reigning at 901 days with the most title defenses.

As of February 8, 2021.

† Indicates the current champion
Rank Wrestler No. of
reigns		 Combined
defenses		 Combined
days
1 Shinsuke Nakamura 5 17 901
2 Tetsuya Naito 6 8 814
3 Hiroshi Tanahashi 2 5 322
4 Hirooki Goto 2 3 308
5 Chris Jericho 1 1 209
6 MVP 1 2 148
7 Kenny Omega 1 1 126
8 Masato Tanaka 1 3 125
9 Jay White 1 1 104
10 Kota Ibushi † 2 2 99+
11 Michael Elgin 1 1 98
12 Minoru Suzuki 1 1 92
Bad Luck Fale 1 0 92
14 La Sombra 1 1 50
15 Evil 1 1 48

References
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  2. Meltzer, Dave (October 3, 2010). "New Japan Pro Wrestling comes to the U.S." Wrestling Observer Newsletter. Archived from the original on October 6, 2010. Retrieved May 13, 2011.
  3. Caldwell, James (January 5, 2011). "NJPW News: New Japan to introduce new title on U.S. tour, officially announces dates & venues for "Invasion" tour". Pro Wrestling Torch. Retrieved May 13, 2011.
  4. Johnson, Mike (January 4, 2011). "New Japan announces dates and cities for American tour". Pro Wrestling Insider. Retrieved June 24, 2017.
  5. Powell, Jason (January 4, 2021). "1/4 NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 15 results: Powell's review of Tetsuya Naito vs. Kota Ibushi for the IWGP Heavyweight and IWGP Intercontinental Championships, Kazuchika Okada vs. Will Ospreay, Hiromu Takahashi vs. El Phantasmo for a shot at the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Championship". Pro Wrestling Dot Net. Retrieved January 4, 2021.
  6. "NY遠征最終日、真壁がライノ撃破! 初代インターコンチ王者はMVP！ ライガーまさかの王座陥落!!（結果速報）". New Japan Pro-Wrestling (in Japanese). May 16, 2011. Archived from the original on July 28, 2011. Retrieved May 16, 2011.
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  31. tps://411mania.com/wrestling/csonkas-njpw-destruction-in-kobe-2019-review/
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