For 28 years, Matt Hardy has entertained audiences around the world with his high-flying antics and multiple personalities. While his brother Jeff gets a lot of attention for his athletic ability, Matt has managed to break out on his own and reinvent himself time after time no matter where he ends up performing.
Matt has also been able to acquire an extensive collection of championships on his travels. Whether it be a tag team title or a world championship, Matt Hardy has proven why he's a legend of the business and someone who can carry a company on his back. Here are Matt's 10 best title reigns of all time, ranked.
10 WWE Hardcore Championship (April 24, 2000)
In the 2000s, the WWE Hardcore Championship was the equivalent of today's 24/7 title in that it was defended any time and anywhere. Crash Holly was just like R Truth; he would chase down the championship any chance he had and would go on to win the title 22 times.
Matt would defeat Crash on an episode of RAW to win his first-ever Hardcore Championship, but he would lose it again the following night on SmackDown while he was defending it against his brother Jeff. Crash snuck in to get the pin and would go on to hold the title for eleven days before losing it again.
9 ROH Tag Team Championship (March 4, 2017)
At Ring of Honor's Manhatten Mayhem VI, fans in attendance thought there was a power outage when the lights went out after The Young Bucks had retained their titles against Lio Rush and Jay White. But when the lights came back on, Matt and Jeff were in the middle of the ring.
The Bucks would defend their titles for the second time in the night against The Hardys but would come up short. Matt and Jeff would hold the championships for a month before losing them back to The Young Bucks at Supercard Of Honor XI.
8 OMEGA Heavyweight Championship (November 21, 2015)
The Organization of Modern Extreme Grappling Arts, or OMEGA for short, was founded in 1997 by Matt and Jeff Hardy when there weren't a lot of independent promotions around. OMEGA originally closed in 1999 but was resurrected in 2013. Matt would win his second Heavyweight Championship with the company when he defeated Trevor Lee in 2015.
At the time, he was also holding the TNA World Heavyweight Championship and proclaimed that as he held both titles, he was more of a champion than any other wrestler in any promotion.
7 ECW Championship (September 7, 2008)
While the WWE version of ECW isn't held in high regard, it did feature some talented Heavyweight champions including, Mark Henry, Christian, CM Punk, and of course, Matt Hardy.
Hardy would win the title at Unforgiven in a Championship Scramble match, which meant that whoever scored the last pinfall or submission at the end of the 20-minute time limit would become the ECW Champion. Hardy won the match with a twist of fate on The Miz to earn his first top-tier title in the WWE.
6 WWE Cruiserweight Championship (February 23, 2003)
Matt reinvented himself as Version 1.0 when he moved to SmackDown in 2003. Along with his Mattitude follower, Shannon Moore, Hardy made it a mission to shed some pounds to make the weight needed to be able to compete for the WWE Cruiserweight Championship.
His hard work paid off, and he scored a title shot with Kidman at No Way Out. Thanks to some help from his follower, Matt would defeat Billy and win the title. He would eventually lose it to Rey Mysterio in the main event of SmackDown, which was the first time the championship had appeared in that slot.
5 WWE European Championship (April 26, 2001)
After dominating the tag team division, Matt and Jeff set their sights on singles titles. Jeff was able to secure the Intercontinental Championship after defeating Triple H with a little help from his brother. Meanwhile, Matt would win the European Championship from Eddie Guerrero and an episode of SmackDown, thanks to an assist from Lita.
Matt would have a successful title reign that would last 125 days, making him the second longest-reigning European Champion and the longest American-born champion. His tenure would come to end thanks to The Hurricane, but it helped give birth to his Version 1.0 gimmick.
4 WWE United States Championship (April 27, 2008)
After a long and storied rivalry with MVP, which even saw the two become tag team champions, Hardy finally beat his nemesis at Backlash for the United States Championship. Declaring himself a fighting champion, Matt would feature in some classic bouts with the likes of Shelton Benjamin, Elijah Burke, Chavo Guerrero, and Umaga.
During his reign, Hardy found himself drafted to ECW and took the title with him, thus making it exclusive to the brand. However, he eventually lost the title to Shelton Benjamin at The Great American Bash, which meant the title would move to the SmackDown brand.
3 TNA World Heavyweight Championship (October 4, 2015)
On his second stint with TNA, Matt had several runs at the TNA World Heavyweight Championship but came up short each time. At Bound For Glory XI, Matt faced Ethan Carter III and Drew Galloway in a triple threat match for the title. The twist of fate was that Jeff Hardy would turn out to be the special guest referee.
Matt would end up winning the title, but his reign would be short-lived. EC3 would file an injunction that would vacate the championship. But for a short while, Matt Hardy was, for the first time in his career, the face of a wrestling promotion.
2 RAW Tag Team Championship (April 2, 2017)
In what seemed like minutes after losing the Ring of Honor tag team titles to the Young Bucks, Matt and Jeff would return home to WWE and receive an amazing ovation from the crowd at WrestleMania 33.
The Hardys competed in a ladder match for the RAW tag team titles against Gallows and Anderson, Cesaro and Sheamus, and Enzo and Cass. The Hardys didn't miss a beat and secured their eleventh WWE tag team title. Their reign would come to an end at the hands of Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins about a month later.
1 TNA World Heavyweight Championship (January 19, 2016)
While Matt's first reign as TNA World Heavyweight Champion would only last 24 hours, his second one would cement his legacy with the company. Hardy would defeat EC3 on an episode of Impact, after Carter's bodyguard, Tyrus, turned on him to become the champ. Later, Matt had a classic bout with Kurt Angle and also defeated EC3 in a Six Side Of Steel match at Lockdown.
Matt would go on to lose his title to Drew Galloway on an episode of Impact after interference from Jeff. This led to a feud between the brothers that helped develop the broken universe.