It is the most wonderful time of the year. It is time once again for Wrestle Kingdom as we preview NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20!
The biggest show of the New Japan Pro Wrestling year, Wrestle Kingdom, is back on its traditional January 4th date.
For this Wrestle Kingdom, we have stars from New Japan, Stardom, and AEW competing on Sunday night. It will be great to see some of the best wrestlers in the world in front of a sold-out Tokyo Dome crowd.
The Wrestle Kingdom 20 card is a truly stacked card that has been built well over 2025. The main card will have seven matches, six titles on the line, and a special main event that will end the career of one of the all-time greats in Hiroshi Tanahashi.
It will be wonderful to see New Japan begin what should be a wonderful 2026. Here is the preview of Wrestle Kingdom 20:
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
NEVER Openweight 6 Man Championship Tornado Ranbo:
Toru Yano and Spiritech (Master Wato and Yoh) (c) vs. Tiger Mask, Togi Makabe, and Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Boltin Oleg and Bishamon (Hirooki Goto and Yoshi-Hashi) vs. Team 150 (Tomohiro Ishii, Taichi, and Satoshi Kojima) vs. House of Torture (Ren Narita, Sanada, and Yoshinobu Kanemaru) vs. TMDK (Zack Sabre Jr., Ryohei Oiwa, and Hartley Jackson) vs. Kaisei Takechi and RoughStorm (Shota Umino and Yuya Uemura) vs. Bullet Club War Dogs (Clark Connors, Oskar, and Yuto-Ice)
The always enjoyable Ranbo will open Wrestle Kingdom. But this year’s match will be very different from the past years. The NEVER Openweight 6 Man Championship will be on the line this year in a Tornado Ranbo match.
Toru Yano and Spiritech (Master Wato and Yoh) will be defending the titles against seven other teams. Teams will enter at one-minute intervals.
When a member of the team is pinned, submitted or thrown over the top rope, the whole team will be eliminated. It will be pure chaos in the Tokyo Dome.
This match will have some of the biggest factions in New Japan. We have House of Torture, Bullet Club Wars Dogs and TMDK.
We even have both members of the Wrestle Kingdom 19 main event, Zack Sabre Jr. and Shota Umino. It will be quite the way to begin a special show.
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
IWGP Women’s & NJPW STRONG Women’s Double Title Match:
Syuri (c) vs. Saya Kamitani (c)
Syuri defeated Maya Iwatani at All Star Grand Queendom last April to end Iwatani’s 735-day IWGP Women’s Championship reign.
But it wasn’t clear sailing for Syuri. She dealt with an elbow injury in 2025 and lost the IWGP Women’s Championship in just 55 days.
Syuri proved to have the heart of a champion, however. Just two months later, she was back competing in Stardom.
And at King of Pro-Wrestling, Syuri defeated Sareee to become the first-ever two-time champion. It was quite a ride to the Tokyo Dome.
Her opponent for this historic match is Saya Kamitani. As part of Stardom’s H.A.T.E. faction, Kamitani has helped bring record crowds to the company in 2025.
She held the World of Stardom Championship, the top title in the company for the entire calendar year. And she even added the Strong Women’s Championship on September 27, 2025.
What will happen when two of the best in women’s wrestling face off in the Tokyo Dome? The winner will leave with both the IWGP Women’s Championship and the Strong Women’s Championship. Who can handle the biggest stage of their careers?
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
David Finlay, Shingo Takagi, Gabe Kidd, Drilla Moloney & Hiromu Takahashi vs. United Empire (Callum Newman, Great-O-Khan, HENARE, Andrade El Idolo & X)
A special 10-man tag match will be part of Wrestle Kingdom 20. Callum Newman has had many issues with the Bullet Club War Dogs over the years. And departures and injuries seemed to be the end of the United Empire that Newman was leading.
At the World Tag League Final, Callum Newman & Great-O-Khan fought David Finlay and Hiromu Takahashi. It ended in under seven minutes when Newman tossed a chair at Hiromu’s head. It led to a challenge at Wrestle Kingdom.
Newman will have some back-up on Sunday night. Besides Great-O-Khan, he will have a returning HENARE. But the biggest shock is we found out the new financial benefactor for the United Empire, Andrade El Idolo.
He will join the group at the Tokyo Dome and he will be joined by a mystery partner as well. It adds a lot of intrigue to this very personal feud.
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
El Desperado vs. Kosei Fujita vs. Taiji Ishimori vs. Sho
(IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship Number One Contender’s Four Way Match)
It is certainly surprising to see the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship not defended at Wrestle Kingdom. In fact, it will be the first time since 2012 that hasn’t happened. DOUKI, the reigning champion, will not be defending in the Tokyo Dome.
DOUKI won the title from El Desperado on October 7th. He did so with a lot of outside interference from Sho. But El Desperado isn’t the only wrestler worthy of a title shot against the champion.
Kosei Fujita, winner of the Best of Super Juniors, has a legitimate beef too. He lost a IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship match in September against DOUKI and Sho. It seems to be a bit of a pattern.
And then we had Taiji Ishimori. He was the first opponent that DOUKI defended the Junior Heavyweight Championship against in his first reign back in September 2024. But DOUKI was willing to take on any challenge in those days. That will not occur at Wrestle Kingdom 20.
Faced with three legitimate challenges, DOUKI said no. He bowed out of Wrestle Kingdom 20 and will have Sho fight with the other three to determine the number one contender. Who will win the right to challenge DOUKI and will he still make his presence known on Sunday night?
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
NEVER Openweight Championship:
EVIL (c) vs. Aaron Wolf
Aaron Wolf is the newest signee to New Japan Wrestling. Wolf won the Olympic gold medal for Japan at the 2020 Olympics in Judo. When he signed with the company back in June, it was announced that his first match would be at Wrestle Kingdom 20. He has picked quite the opponent for his debut.
EVIL, the leader of House of Torture, cheated his way yet again to defeat Boltin Oleg at King of Pro-Wrestling to win the NEVER Openweight Championship.
Naturally, that wasn’t enough for House of Torture, who continued to attack Oleg after the match. This was more than enough for Wolf, who got physically involved attacking House of Torture.
Since that October night, Wolf has acted as an enforcer against House of Torture. He even helped prevent EVIL and his group from winning the NEVER Openweight 6 Man Championship at World Tag League Finals.
EVIL will get some chance at revenge at Wrestle Kingdom 20. Can Aaron Wolf, in his debut match, overcome the odds (and cheating) to defeat EVIL and win the NEVER Openweight Championship? It would be quite a feat for sure.
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
IWGP Global & IWGP World Heavyweight Double Title Match-
Yota Tsuji (c) vs Konosuke Takeshita (c)
It is another huge Double Title match at Wrestle Kingdom 20. Konosuke Takeshita won the G1 Climax in 2025 and then proceeded to use his title shot at King of Pro-Wrestling against Zack Sabre Jr. to win the biggest prize in New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Can the AEW wrestler add to his already impressive legacy and defend the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship in the Tokyo Dome?
Enter Yota Tsuji. At Tanashasi’s Final Homecoming in November, Tsuji defeated the legendary Hiroshi Tanahashi to defend his IWGP Global Championship. It was an emotional moment for Yota who quickly challenged Takeshita at Wrestle Kingdom 20.
Tsuji wants to usher in a new era for New Japan in a post-Tanahasi era. He has vowed to bring back the legendary IWGP Heavyweight Championship and bring the glory back to New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Can he do so on Sunday night? If not, Takeshita will hold the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship and the IWGP Global Championship. Taking them both back to AEW would certainly be damaging to the pride of NJPW.
NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 20
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Kazuchika Okada
(Hiroshi Tanahashi Retirement Match)
It has all come down to this. Hiroshi Tanahashi’s legendary twenty-seven-year career will end with one final match at Wrestle Kingdom 20.
He announced his retirement was coming over a year ago. The question was always who would face the legend in his final match.
The choice, in the end, was rather obvious. Kazuchika Okada, now of AEW, will do the honors on Sunday night. They faced each other in New Japan Pro Wrestling seventeen times in their storied history in singles action. They have even faced off in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom on three previous occasions.
At Wrestle Kingdom 7, a young Kazuhika Okada challenged Tanahashi for the first time in the Tokyo Dome. Hiroshi Tanahashi defended the title that night. But that wasn’t the end of their legendary Tokyo Dome feud.
At Wrestle Kingdom 9, Okada challenged Tanahashi yet again for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. For the second time, Tanahashi defeated “The Rainmaker” yet again. It seemed Okada couldn’t overcome Hiroshi on the biggest stage.
That is until Wrestle Kingdom 10. This time Okada was the champion and defended it against the challenging Tanahashi. And finally, Okada was able to defeat his long-time rival on the biggest stage possible.
It has been ten years since their last Wrestle Kingdom main event. A lot has changed in the world of pro wrestling including Okada joining All Elite Wrestling.
Can “The Ace” deliver his magic one last time in the Tokyo Dome? Or will Okada ruin the special night for Tanahashi? Regardless of the outcome, it will be truly the end of an era in New Japan.
