When Will Japan Get Its First UFC Champion? Rankings and Upcoming Fights (October 2026)

As of 14 October 2026, no Japanese fighter has ever held a UFC championship. The closest right now is Tatsuro Taira, ranked No. 4 at flyweight (26, 18-2), who challenged champion Joshua Van in May 2026 and was stopped in round five. Three Japanese fighters currently appear in the UFC rankings (UFC media rankings, checked 14 October 2026). The next Japanese fighters in the octagon are Keiichiro Nakamura on 8 November (Japan time) and Kyoji Horiguchi against No. 7 flyweight Asu Almabayev on 22 November (Japan time). What separates them from a belt is not talent — it is time spent beating ranked opponents in a row.

Where things stand

Two more are moving fast outside the UFC media rankings (Tsuruya is No. 14 in the UFC's separate All Meta Rankings on the same page).

• Rei Tsuruya (24, 12-1) — 3-1 in the UFC, his only loss to current flyweight champion Joshua Van, and two straight first-round rear-naked chokes.
• Kai Asakura (32, 23-6) — back at bantamweight with two consecutive finishes, UFC record 2-2.

Both won on the same night at UFC Shanghai on 29 August 2026 (→ UFC Shanghai results).

Next fights — Japanese fighters on the November 2026 cards

As of 14 October 2026, these are the two bouts involving Japanese fighters on the UFC's official event pages.

• Horiguchi vs Almabayev — Horiguchi's first fight since losing to Manel Kape (now No. 2) in June. Almabayev is on a three-fight win streak on his UFC record, most recently a submission at UFC Baku in June 2026. In terms of the first indicator below, this is fight one of a new run against ranked opposition.
• Nakamura vs Schmid — Nakamura stopped Sebastian Szalay in round three at UFC 325 (1 February 2026, Japan time) to win the Road to UFC Season 4 featherweight tournament. The UFC's official bio describes him as the first Japanese fighter to win the Road to UFC featherweight tournament.
• Taira, Tsuruya, Asakura and Mizuki — no next fight is listed on their UFC athlete pages (checked 14 October 2026). This page will add them once they are booked.

Cards change late. Check the exact bout times and the main card / prelim split on the UFC event pages in fight week (8 November, 22 November). Horiguchi's last fight is covered in Kape vs Horiguchi.

Japan has been close before

In 2015 Sports Navi described Horiguchi as the fourth Japanese fighter to challenge for a UFC title, after Caol Uno, Hayato "Mach" Sakurai and Yushin Okami. The highest rankings any Japanese fighter has reached are No. 3 — Okami at middleweight in 2013, Horiguchi at flyweight in 2015, and Taira at flyweight in 2026. Japan keeps reaching third and stopping there.

Why it stalls — three walls

1. Too much of it happens at flyweight

All three title challenges above came at flyweight. Japan's depth genuinely sits in the lighter divisions, but that also means every Japanese contender is competing for the same single belt — which is why two of the three currently ranked fighters are in the same division.

Kai Asakura's move back to bantamweight is, among other things, a move against that concentration.

2. The finishing is there. The consecutiveness is not

Taira earned his title shot by knocking out Brandon Moreno in round two at UFC 323 in December 2025. Horiguchi reached the Kape fight on back-to-back wins over ranked opposition — a submission of Tagir Ulanbekov and a decision over Amir Albazi. The quality of the wins is world class.

The problem is the one or two fights between contention and the belt. Championships are awarded for streaks that did not break, not for a single best night.

3. Japanese fighters keep being handed the title shot first

Kai Asakura's UFC debut was a title fight. That maximises the occasion, but it also means facing a champion without a single fight to adjust to the octagon. It took him two years to rebuild from there — a fair measure of what that structure costs.

Who is closest

Short term (2026–27): Tatsuro Taira. Twenty-six, ranked fourth, and he has already gone five rounds with the champion. Few fighters in the division have beaten Van, so one win over a top-three contender puts a rematch on the table.

Medium term (2027–29): Rei Tsuruya. Twenty-four, 3-1 in the UFC, his only loss to the champion, and two first-round submissions in three months. That style of win travels to the top of the division. What he needs is ranked opposition to be booked against him.

The variable: Kai Asakura. Thirty-two is against him, but bantamweight turns over faster than flyweight and rewards knockout power. One ranked scalp would move him a long way.

Women's: Mizuki. The first Japanese woman ever ranked by the UFC. Strawweight's upper half changes quickly, and win streaks convert to ranking positions there faster than in most divisions.

When? Three things to watch

Forecasting this requires three conditions, not optimism:

1. Two consecutive wins over ranked opponents. One is never enough to be handed a title fight.
2. A ranked Japanese fighter outside flyweight. More belts in play means more paths.
3. A second title shot for someone who already had one. Fighters who return to a championship fight tend to do better the second time.

KIAI tracks all three. Every time a Japanese fighter competes in the UFC, the numbers on this page are updated.

Sources

• UFC official rankings — https://www.ufc.com/rankings (media panel, last updated 6 Oct; checked 14 October 2026)
• UFC event pages — https://www.ufc.com/event/ufc-fight-night-november-07-2026 and https://www.ufc.com/event/ufc-fight-night-november-21-2026 (checked 14 October 2026)
• UFC athlete pages for Keiichiro Nakamura, Asu Almabayev and Mizuki; ESPN fight history for Keiichiro Nakamura; Heavy.com, "High-Level Flyweight Bout Added to UFC Qatar" (24 September 2026)
• UFC athlete pages for Tatsuro Taira, Kyoji Horiguchi, Kai Asakura and Rei Tsuruya
• Sports Navi, "Caol Uno backs Horiguchi in bid to become Japan's first UFC champion" (April 2015)
• SPREAD, "Records of Japanese fighters in the UFC" (highest rankings reached)