Ranking the 10 Greatest WWE IC Champions of All Time

Ranking the 10 Greatest WWE IC Champions of All Time

Jun 16, 2022

The Intercontinental Championship is one of the longest-standing and most prestigious titles in all of WWE, but the last few years have not been strong when it comes to how titleholders have been booked.

Even with a string of uneventful reigns and missed opportunities, this belt still holds a special place in the heart of many fans because so many legendary Superstars have held it.

For a long time, it was known as the workhorse championship. The WWE title was reserved for the biggest names, but the IC belt was usually put on a guy the company was trying to test with a push or one of the best workers on the roster.

Several legends who never held the World Heavyweight Championship found success with the intercontinental title, such as Roddy PIper, Mr. Perfect and Owen Hart. In many ways, it has a more colorful lineage than the WWE Championship.

Almost 100 competitors have held the title, but we are going to try to boil it down to the top 10. Some lists like this are based solely on subjective criteria created by the author, but we are going to try to use some data and career highlights to reinforce why certain people made the list over others.

This will not be ranking the best Superstars to hold the belt based on their entire careers. It will solely be focused on highlighting the people who did the most with the intercontinental title.

The Honky Tonk Man may have only held the Intercontinental Championship once, but that reign is still the longest single run any Superstar has had with the title at 454 days.

From June 1987 all the way until the following August in 1988, HTM reigned supreme over the midcard division. As a heel, he mostly used dirty tactics to keep the belt around his waist.

Ironically, his most famous defense of the title is probably the match where he lost it. At SummerSlam 1988, The Ultimate Warrior defeated The Honky Tonk Man to win the IC title in a fight that was over in less than a minute.

After such a long reign, putting over the Warrior in this way helped cement him as the next big thing in WWE.

With five reigns totalling almost a year in combined length, Jeff Hardy is one of the most decorated intercontinental champions of all time.

His first reign came in 2001 when he beat Triple H in a huge upset for the title on SmackDown, but The Game would quickly regain the belt the following week on Raw.

Subsequent reigns were far more successful and featured The Charismatic Enigma locking up with some of the biggest names in the industry.

He might be known for his tag team accomplishments, but for many WWE fans who grew up during the time when Jeff and Matt Hardy were doing their own things as singles stars, the painted brother is mostly known for winning this belt several times.

A few classic ladder matches took place during his time as the champ, but his series of bouts against Umaga might be the biggest highlight of his entire time holding the championship.

Those two fought each other in several different kinds of matches and always managed to raise the level of excitement. They had one of the great underrated feuds of the 2000s.

Tito Santana was a staple of WWE programming and one of the greatest babyfaces to hold the intercontinental title.

With only two reigns on his resume, he still manages to be No. 5 on the list of those who have held the belt for the most combined days at 443, although due to how TV tapings work, only 441 days are recognized by WWE.

In fact, Santana became the first champion to win the belt after WWE cut ties with the NWA, succeeding the legendary Don Muraco.

His second win was against Greg Valentine inside a steel cage, and he eventually lost the championship to Randy Savage in 1986.

For the better part of two years, Santana was one of the company's most featured stars. He is not brought up nearly enough when people discuss the best WWE Superstars of all time.

It's safe to say that as soon as you saw the title of this article, a lot of you reading this knew Shawn Michaels would appear on the list.

The Heartbreak Kid had success with just about every title he could hold during his WWE career, but a lot of kids who grew up in the 1990s knew him as the guy who helped bring the ladder match out of obscurity and into regular rotation.

His bouts with Razor Ramon at WrestleMania 10 and SummerSlam 1995 are arguably the two most well-known of his IC title matches, and they still hold up today.

But HBK didn't just feud with The Bad Guy during his three reigns. He also had some classic matches with the likes of Bret Hart, Rick Martel, and his former Rockers partner, Marty Jannetty.

For some people, Michaels is one of the reasons why this belt is held in such high regard.

"Macho Man" Randy Savage is another one of those people with one lengthy title reign to their name, but his does include one of the greatest WrestleMania matches of all time.

After over 400 days as the titleholder, Savage dropped the belt to Ricky Steamboat at WrestleMania 3 in a bout that people still talk about to this day.

The technical precision was unlike anything we usually saw on WWE programming. Both guys were firing on all cylinders and making every single thing they did matter to the overall story they were telling from bell to bell.

As one of the most beloved legends of all time, Savage is remembered fondly for a lot of things he did throughout his career, but many would agree that his bout with The Dragon was one of his best.

It has been almost 40 years since Pedro Morales held the Intercontinental Championship after losing it to Don Muraco in January 1983, but he still has the record for most combined days as champion, with two reigns that lasted a total of 617 days as recognized by WWE.

The Puerto Rican was one of the guys who helped put WWE on the map in the 1980s, and he was only the third Superstar to hold the title after Pat Patterson and Ken Patera.

Morales is another one of those old-school stars who made a huge impact in his day but is not talked about much by younger generations who did not get to see him perform live.

Look up some of his old matches, and you will see a great representation of what good pro wrestling looked like in those days.

People can hate on The Miz all they want for being an obnoxious heel with a gorgeous wife and a reality show, but none of that stops him from being one of the best intercontinental champions in the modern era.

Not only is he No. 2 in overall reigns with a total of eight, but he is also No. 2 when it comes to combined days as champion with 592.

That is over a year and a half of his career that has been spent with that one belt around his waist. Morales is the only other person who can claim to have held it longer.

Not only did The A-Lister consistently work his butt off to make the title feel as important as possible, but some of his best matches came while defending it.

He has tangled with countless big names over this title for the past decade. If you don't think The Miz deserves to be on this list, that is based on your own opinion of him and not what he has actually done with the belt.

Objectively, he is one of the top champions of all time.

We already talked about Razor Ramon's classic encounters with Michaels for the title in ladder matches, but those two bouts are not the only reasons why The Bad Guy belongs on this list.

As one of WWE's most merchandised stars of the 1990s, Ramon was one of the company's most popular and recognizable characters.

In fact, he was so well-known that WWE even tried to have somebody else step into the gimmick after Scott Hall left for WCW. The less said about the fake Razor, the better.

With 434 days as champion across four reigns, Ramon is still statistically one of the top 10 champions of all time. He is also a lot of people's favorite titleholder and that may have been more important to him than any of the stats.

When it comes to pro wrestlers, Curt Hennig is one of the few guys who could get away with calling himself something like Mr. Perfect.

His ability to have an amazing match with anybody who stepped through the ropes not only made him successful but also made him important to the success of those he put over.

One of the best examples of how he helped make somebody else look good was when he lost the IC title to Bret Hart at SummerSlam 1991.

If you have never seen this match, take the time to watch it. Not only does it still stand up against any modern wrestling, but it is one of the greatest bouts either man was in.

And it's not just his skill that puts Hennig on this list. His two reigns were over 400 days together, so he also has the data to back up his inclusion.

Chris Jericho may not have held the title for as many days as The Miz or Morales, but the fact that he still holds the record for most reigns with nine that total over 300 days made it easy to put him at the top of the list.

The current All Elite Wrestling star has been considered a top performer for most of his career, but he also spent a lot of time in the midcard scene in WWE making it feel more important with his presence.

Having his star power and ability to entertain helped reinvigorate the IC title at times, and many of his matches can still be enjoyed because they were so good.

He first won the belt over 23 years ago at Armageddon 1999 from Chyna, who would later go on to co-hold the belt with him in one of the most unusual situations in the history of the championship.

He faced the likes of Kurt Angle, Triple H, Rob Van Dam and Shelton Benjamin in some amazing bouts during his time with the belt.

Most lists like this are going to be subjective in some way, so there are bound to be people others think should be included. Let us know who you think are among the best IC champions of all time in the comment section.