Although women have participated in boxing for almost as long as the sport has existed, female fights have been effectively outlawed for most of boxing's history until recently, with athletic commissioners refusing to sanction or issue licenses to women boxers, and most nations officially banning the sport. Reports of women entering the ring go back to the 18th century.
Friba Rezayee, is a Hazara judoka, who is perhaps best known as one of the first two women athletes from Afghanistan to compete in the Summer Olympics. The Taliban controlling most of Afghanistan had caused the country to be banned from the Olympics in 1999 due to discrimination against women under Taliban rule as well as its prohibition of sports of any kind, and thus missed out on the Sydney Olympics of the year 2000. In June 2003, the IOC lifted the suspension imposed on Afghanistan during the 115th IOC Session in Prague, and the country sent a delegation of five competitors to the Athens Games in 2004. Rezayee and Robina Muqimyar were two women contingents in the delegation, becoming the first ever women to compete for Afghanistan at the Olympics.
Puerto Rico competed in the 2008 Summer Olympics which was held in Beijing, People's Republic of China from August 8 to August 24, 2008. The American territory with a population of four million people qualified 22 athletes in eight different sports. The appearance of the Puerto Rican delegation at the Beijing Olympics marked the commonwealth's sixteenth consecutive appearance at the Summer Olympics, and its twenty-second appearance at any Olympic Games, since its debut at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London, England. Of its competitors participating in events that involve progression by heats, six athletes advanced at least one round in their events, and two advanced at least two rounds, with Asunción Ocasio almost medaling bronze in taekwondo. However, there were no Puerto Rican medalists at the Beijing Olympics. McWilliams Arroyo, a boxer, bore Puerto Rico's flag at the ceremonies.
Mangte Chungneijang "Mary" Kom is an Indian Olympic boxer, politician, and former Member of Rajya Sabha. She is the only woman to win the World Amateur Boxing Championship six times, the only female boxer to have won a medal in each one of the first seven World Championships, and the only boxer to win eight World Championship medals. Nicknamed Magnificent Mary, she was the only Indian female boxer to have qualified for the 2012 Summer Olympics, where she competed in the flyweight (51 kg) category and won a bronze medal. She had also been ranked as the world's No. 1 female light-flyweight by the International Boxing Association (amateur) (AIBA). She became the first Indian female boxer to win a gold medal in the Asian Games in 2014 at Incheon, South Korea and is the first Indian female boxer to win gold at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. She is also the only boxer to become Asian Amateur Boxing Champion for a record six times. Mary Kom won the 51kg gold in President's Cup in Indonesia.
Bianca "Bam Bam" Elmir is an Australian boxer from Canberra, ACT. She has been the Australian Flyweight Champion and the Oceania Boxing Bantamweight Champion. Since starting to box in 2009, Elmir has aimed for one thing: to compete in the Olympics.
Claressa Maria Shields is an American professional boxer and professional mixed martial artist. She has held multiple world championships in five weight classes, including the undisputed female light middleweight title since March 2021; the World Boxing Organization (WBO) female light heavyweight title and the World Boxing Council (WBC) and World Boxing Federation (WBF) female heavyweight titles since July 2024; the undisputed female middleweight title from 2019 to 2020; and the unified WBC and IBF female super middleweight titles from 2017 to 2018. Shields currently holds the record for becoming a two and three division world champion in the fewest professional fights. As of October 2022, she is ranked the world's best active female middleweight by BoxRec, as well as the best active female boxer, pound for pound, by ESPN and The Ring.
Lauren Louise Price is a Welsh professional boxer, former amateur boxer and former kickboxer and footballer. She has held the WBA, IBO, and Ring female welterweight World titles since 11 May 2024. She was the first-ever female British professional boxing champion having won the welterweight title on 6 May 2023 and holding it until vacating the belt when she became World champion. While representing Wales in the amateur sport she won a bronze medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, becoming the first Welsh woman to win a Commonwealth Games boxing medal. Four years later she surpassed this achievement by winning gold at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, followed by a gold at the 2019 World Championships. While representing Great Britain, she won gold medals at the 2019 European Games and 2020 Summer Olympics.
Nesthy "Nesh" Alcayde Petecio, OLY is a Filipino amateur boxer. She won a silver medal in the inaugural women's featherweight event at the 2020 Summer Olympics, becoming the first Filipino woman to win an Olympic medal in boxing. She also won a silver medal at the 2014 World Championships and gold at the 2019 edition.
Skye Brittany Nicolson is an Australian professional boxer. As an amateur, she competed in the featherweight event at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, winning the gold medal. Nicolson competed at the 2020 Summer Olympics. In her first bout in the women's Feather (54–57 kg) preliminaries she beat Im Ae-ji from Republic of Korea on points. She was beaten in the quarterfinals by Kariss Artingstall from Great Britain.
Lovlina Borgohain is an Indian boxer. She won a bronze medal at the 2020 Olympic Games in the women's welterweight event, becoming only the third Indian boxer to win a medal at the Olympics. She won gold medal at 2023 IBA Women's World Boxing Championships and bronze medals at the 2018 AIBA Women's World Boxing Championships and the 2019 AIBA Women's World Boxing Championships. Borgohain is the first female athlete and the second boxer from Assam to represent the state in the Olympics. In 2020, she became the sixth person from Assam to receive Arjuna Award.
Barbra Banda is a Zambian professional footballer who plays as a forward for the Orlando Pride of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) and captains the Zambia women's national football team. As of July 2021, she is Africa's all-time top scorer in Olympic history. In 2021, she became the first woman footballer in Olympic history to score back-to-back hat tricks and the first to score two hat tricks in one tournament. In 2020, she was the top scorer in the Chinese Women's Super League.
Lin Yu-ting is a Taiwanese boxer from New Taipei City. As a child, Lin and her older brother watched the anime Hajime no Ippo, which inspired her to consider boxing. Lin also learned boxing in an effort to protect her mother from domestic abuse.
Karriss Artingstall is an English professional boxer. As an amateur she won a bronze medal at the 2020 Olympics, silver at the 2019 European Championships and bronze at the 2019 World Championships.
Angela Carini is an Italian amateur boxer.
Harrison Garside is an Australian boxer and plumber. He competed in the men's lightweight event at the 2020 Summer Olympics where he won the bronze medal. This marked the first time in more than three decades that an Australian medaled in boxing at the Olympics.
Imane Khelif is an Algerian professional boxer. She represented Algeria at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. On 3 August 2024, she would clinch at least a bronze medal in Paris after reaching the women's 66 kg semifinals, making her Algeria's first boxer to win an Olympic medal since 2000.
Cherneka Johnson is a New Zealand-Australian professional boxer. Born in New Zealand, she represents Australia in international competition. She is a two-weight world champion currently holding the WBA female bantamweight World title having previously been IBF female super-bantamweight World champion.
The 2023 IBA Women's World Boxing Championships were the 13th edition of the championships, held in New Delhi, India from 15 to 26 March 2023. India topped the medal tally for the first time after 2006.
Hergie Tao-Wag Bacyadan is a Filipino boxer and former wushu and vovinam practitioner who has competed in the women's division in all sports.
Anna Luca Hámori is a Hungarian amateur boxer.
