Khabib Nurmagomedov
Fedor Emelianenko
Stat by stat
Bars are scaled to the leader in this list.
The verdict
Fedor Emelianenko leads 3 of 4 categories. Our all-time ranking places Khabib Nurmagomedov at #4 and Fedor Emelianenko at #7.
The case for Khabib Nurmagomedov
The most dominant grappler the sport has known, Khabib retired flawless at 29-0, having barely lost a round across his entire career. A multiple-time combat sambo world champion from Dagestan, he built a smothering, cage-crushing wrestling style — 'send them off,' as his father put it — that no opponent solved. He won the vacant lightweight title against Al Iaquinta at UFC 223 in 2018, then defended it in the biggest fight in company history, submitting Conor McGregor by neck crank in the fourth round at UFC 229 before roughly 2.4 million pay-per-view buyers. He followed with submissions of Dustin Poirier and, in his final bout, a third-round triangle choke of Justin Gaethje at UFC 254 in 2020. He retired immediately afterward, honoring a promise to his mother following his father's death, walking away perfect.
The case for Fedor Emelianenko
'The Last Emperor' was the consensus best heavyweight in the world through the mid-2000s and the defining icon of Japan's PRIDE era. A master of combat sambo, he combined unorthodox looping punches with slick submissions and an unshakable calm, going undefeated for nearly a decade — a run of 28 fights without a legitimate loss from 2000 to 2010. As PRIDE heavyweight champion he beat Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Mirko Cro Cop, Mark Coleman and a young Andrei Arlovski, whom he stopped with a flying-punch knockout. He never competed in the UFC, which fuels endless debate about his placement, and his level of competition in some later fights is questioned. But at his peak, against the best heavyweights alive, he was untouchable, and he retired around 40-7 as one of the most beloved and mythologized figures the sport has produced.