The New Japan Cup is an annual knockout tournament run by New Japan Pro Wrestling. It features between 16 and 48 wrestlers from NJPW, with the winner of each match advancing to the next round. This continues until there are only two wrestlers left, and the pair have a match together at the New Japan Cup Finals event that year.

The winner of the tournament is given a trophy for their efforts, as well as a title match against the reigning IWGP World Heavyweight Champion (except for Shinsuke Nakamura in 2014, who instead challenged for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship).

The first New Japan Cup took place in 2005, with Hiroshi Tananhashi winning the tournament. Since then, with 14 winners in the past 21 tournaments. On Tanahashi (2), Yugi Nagata (2), Kazuchika Okada (2), Zack Sabre Jr (2) and Hirooki Goto (3) have won the cup more than once, with many wrestlers reaching the final multiple times without winning.

Here is a list of every winner of the New Japan Cup since 2005. Below lists the winner, the year and date they won the cup, as well as who their final opponent was and the match rating for the bout (as voted by fans on Cagematch.net.

Year	Winner	Date	Final	Match Rating
2005	Hiroshi Tanahashi	April 24, 2005	Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Manabu Nakanishi	Not Rated
2006	Giant Bernard	April 30, 2006	Yuji Nagata vs. Giant Bernard	7.67
2007	Yugi Nagata	March 21, 2007	Yuji Nagata vs. Togi Makabe	6.75
2008	Hiroshi Tanahashi	March 23, 2008	Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Giant Bernard	7.65
2009	Hirooki Goto	March 22, 2009	Hirooki Goto vs. Giant Bernard	Not Rated
2010	Hirooki Goto	March 22, 2010	Togi Makabe vs. Hirooki Goto	8.00
2011	Yugi Nagata	March 20, 2011	Yuji Nagata vs. Shinsuke Nakamura	7.69
2012	Hirooki Goto	April 8, 2012	Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Hirooki Goto	8.22
2013	Kazuchika Okada	March 23, 2013	Hirooki Goto vs. Kazuchika Okada	7.93
2014	Shinsuke Nakamura	March 23, 2014	Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Bad Luck Fale	7.29
2015	Kota Ibushi	March 15, 2015	Hirooki Goto vs. Kota Ibushi	7.95
2016	Tetsuya Naito	March 12, 2016	Hirooki Goto vs. Tetsuya Naito	7.92
2017	Katsuyori Shibata	March 20, 2017	Katsuyori Shibata vs. Bad Luck Fale	7.58
2018	Zack Sabre Jr	March 21, 2018	Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Zack Sabre Jr.	9.03
2019	Kazuchika Okada	March 24, 2019	Kazuchika Okada vs. Sanada	8.66
2020	EVIL	July 11, 2020	Kazuchika Okada vs. Evil	5.55
2021	Will Ospreay	March 21, 2021	Shingo Takagi vs. Will Ospreay	9.03
2022	Zack Sabre Jr	March 27, 2022	Tetsuya Naito vs. Zack Sabre Jr.	8.48
2023	SANADA	March 21, 2023	Sanada vs. David Finlay	7.57
2024	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD

Here are some facts about the winners of the New Japan Cup.

• Giant Bernard, Will Ospreay and Zack Sabre Jr are the only foreign wrestlers to win the tournament (with two of those being English, and one American).
• The 2018 and 2020 finals are the only ones to be rated over 9.00 by Cagematch.
• Hirooki Goto has the most New Japan Cup wins (3) and most final appearances (6). However, he has never won the IWGP Heavyweight Championship.
• Hirooki Goto, Giant Bernard, Zack Sabre Jr and Katuyori Shibata are the only New Japan Cup winners to never win the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship.

Want to learn more about the New Japan Cup? Check out our guide to NJPW to learn more.