Ninja Warrior (franchise)

related	American Ninja Warrior Australian Ninja Warrior Kunoichi Ninja Warrior UK Sasuke Sasuke Ninja Warrior Indonesia Sasuke Vietnam

Ninja Warrior is a sports entertainment reality television franchise that began airing in 1997, and has since aired in 157 countries[1] and been adapted in a total of 26 countries. The series began as a segment called Sasuke [2] on the show Kinniku Banzuke. It began airing internationally in 2005 which led to massive expansion and widespread success. Adaptations began planning immediately, with American Ninja Challenge, Sasuke Malaysia and Sasuke Singapore being the first small-scale adaptations which sent their winners over to Japan. The first large scale adaptation was the fourth season of American Ninja Warrior in 2012, with twenty-two more adaptations launching between 2014 and 2019.

In Ninja Warrior, a group of competitors attempt to complete a four-stage obstacle course. Falling any obstacle, falling in the water, running out of time or losing a head-to-head race results in the competitor being eliminated.[3] Many seasons operate an additional qualification system where as many as 1000 hopefuls take on a series of one to five qualification heats to earn a spot in the finals course.

History

1997–2006: Sasuke and Kunoichi

During the 1996 run of Kinniku Banzuke, a small event called Spider Walk appeared. The course featured a short, 9 obstacle time trial based on the Ninja skill of stealthily walking between walls in alleyways and hallways. Later in 1997, following the debut of the first multi-stage course Hand Walk Tower, assistant producer Masato Inui was tasked with creating a larger, multi-stage course that expanded upon Spider Walk to cover a full array of other ninja skills. Despite being intended as a one-time event, the heavy success of Sasuke led to its ongoing renewal with a new tournament every six months, as well as a full array of spinoffs, most notably with Kunoichi, an all-women's season.

After Kinniku Banzuke ended in 2002, and it's sequel Taiiku World ended in 2003, Sasuke and Kunoichi were launched as standalone specials which have continued ever since.

2007–2019: international expansion

In Summer 2007, G4 launched American Ninja Challenge, a reality show where contestants could audition and take part in a series of challenges to win a spot on Sasuke. After four successful seasons, interest in America grew high enough that G4 decided to ramp up production. 2009 saw the debut season of

Format

Course structure

Ninja Warrior consists of four stages of increasing difficulty; as well as a handful of preliminary rounds used to determine which competitors will appear in the finals. The object is to hit the buzzer at the end of each course before the allotted time expires. If a competitor goes out of bounds, runs out of time or comes into contact with the water in any of the pits below the course, they are eliminated from the competition.

Preliminary Rounds

In most seasons, preliminary rounds consist of a short, 6 obstacle course ending in the warped wall. This round will allow a set amount of competitors to advance, although will allow more than that amount to advance if there are more clears than expected. Some recent seasons will additionally specify a set amount of female competitors who will advance on their own leaderboard.

After this is typically a semifinal round, where a course modeled roughly after the second stage, and often containing a salmon ladder will follow the same rules. In America, the semifinals course attaches the salmon ladder and additional obstacles to the end of the first preliminary course and has competitors attempt them back-to-back.

First stage

The First Stage primarily tests one's general athletic abilities, with a focus on balance, agility, and speed.

Ninja Warrior around the world

Below is a complete list of the countries with their own international adaptation of Sasuke/Ninja Warrior.

This list includes all officially licensed series, as well as unofficial series. Officially licensed series must be via TBS, while unofficial series must specifically have a significant and unmistaken overlap in the format and obstacles to be eligible form inclusion, and should have connections with Sasuke or Ninja Warrior via direct mentions, footage, succession, competitor overlap or legal dispute. In addition, the broadcasts must have been a made-for-tv series, meaning that broadcasts of public events and league competitions will not be included.

For an overview of all international seasons, see List of Ninja Warrior seasons.

For a list of the best performances each season, see List of best results on Ninja Warrior.

Airing: Currently airing franchise
Renewed: Franchise with an upcoming season/version
Forthcoming: Franchise that has been announced but has not broadcast yet
Ended: Franchise no longer airing
Pending: No official renewal or cancellation has occurred

External links

Sasuke 2007 (Sasuke 2007 Autumn) – Tokyo Broadcasting System
Sasuke 2006秋 (Sasuke 2006 Autumn) – Tokyo Broadcasting System
Sasuke 2005・(Sasuke 2005 Winter) – Tokyo Broadcasting System
Diagrams of the 11th course with measurements – Tokyo Broadcasting System
Ninja Warrior on Challenge

References

Ninja Warrior www.tbscontents.com, retrieved 2026-01-28^
Sasuke (TV Series 1997– ) Tokyo Broadcasting System, retrieved 2025-04-28^
Video Dailymotion, retrieved 2025-04-28^

2019–2025: format variations, COVID-19 and IOC certification

By 2019, more than 60% of the international adaptations that had been produced had already ended, with the high costs of production compared to viewership being a primary factor.[4] The situation worsened significantly following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, when production was suspended globally on large scale TV series. American Ninja Warrior 12th season featured modified rules and courses to distance competitors, while the remaining global seasons were postponed until late 2020 or into 2021. The change in market and year away from broadcasting significantly impacted viewership, with returning series seeing greatly reduced ratings across the board, leading to many series being cancelled after 2022. Additionally, productions in Israel and Russia ceased due to the 2022 Ukraine invasion and 2022 Gaza–Israel clashes. By mid 2023, only five countries had series in active production: Japan, the United States, France, Germany and Poland.

In order to regain interest in the series, many adaptations began introducing changes to the format. American Ninja Warrior introduced twists such as the Safety Pass, Speed Pass, Power Tower and side by side racing – all changes that would be seen extensively abroad in the 2020s. Sasuke would remain the only series that remained true to the roots of the series.

Following the failure of KuroOvi, GoldEggs sought to create a chain of ninja gyms across Japan titled Ninja Park, which would additionally host in-person competitions under the banner Ninjathlon. As part of this process, GoldEggs would file trademark ownership claims over several iconic Sasuke obstacles in both Japan and the United States. While unsuccessful in the US, Higuchi and GoldEggs were able to successfully claim six obstacles in Japan. As a result, beginning in Sasuke 40th tournament, several obstacles were renamed to avoid legal injunctions, most notably with the Spider Walk being renamed to Spider Run, and Cliffhanger Dimension being renamed to Cliff Dimension. The trademark registration for the Spider Walk was rejected on November 8, 2022.[5]

Following the conclusion of the 2020 Summer Olympics in 2021, the Union Internationale de Pentathlon Moderne (UIPM) voted to remove Equestrian from the Modern Pentathlon following concerns of Animal rights. Due to extremely low viewership, the UIPM aimed to bring in a new discipline that would make the event more appealing to viewers. Following several rounds of testing and votes, the UIPM voted to add obstacle racing to the modern pentathlon beginning with the 2028 Summer Olympics.[6] The course would be standardized and obstacles would be licensed directly from Sasuke and TBS, finally fulfilling Ushio Higuchi's initial dream of creating a new sport after 35 years. Conversely, Sasuke 39th tournament debuted a new final stage featuring a Speed climbing zone, with a layout variant of the normal standard.

Due to Japan's success in winning 3 Gold, 1 Silver and 1 Bronze in Skateboarding during its debut at the 2020 Summer Olympics, TBS launched Kasso four months prior to the 2024 Summer Olympics to build up hype for the event.[7] Kasso is an official spinoff that fuses Sasuke format with skateboarding in the style of Skeboarder from Kinniku Banzuke. While the show was a failure in Japan and was cancelled shortly after broadcast, the first tournament netted an unexpected 6 million views internationally within one year, prompting the immediate revival and international licensing of the series by TBS.[8] The second tournament was confirmed and, like the previous one, it resonated around the world.[9]

Following this announcement, TBS would invest heavily into the Sasuke brand. In 2024, TBS broadcast the first ever Sasuke World Cup shortly after the 2024 Summer Olympics, featuring a total of 35 top ninja competitors from Australia, France, Germany, Japan and the United States.[10] In January 2025, TBS rebooted Kunoichi and Sasuke Junior.[11] In March 2025, TBS debuted a new spinoff format called Hanzo that brought in elements of swimming, shooting, fencing and running to align the format more closely with the Modern Pentathlon.[12] American Ninja Warrior and Ninja Warrior Poland would both alter the formats of their 2025 seasons to feature side-by-side racing brackets similar to the IOC standard instead of the original Survival Attack format, an element that was previously seen on Ninja Warrior UK sixth season.

Format definitions

Bracket

Individuals or teams compete in a Single-elimination tournament or Double-elimination tournament based around brackets to determine advancement through each stage.

Dogs

A team of one dog and one human compete together, and both must clear the course for a victory. The human may not pick up their dog, but may use their body as a prop such as a bridge or ladder to help the dog along.[28]

Elimination

Individuals or teams are eliminated at the end of round based on their performance. Performance is typically determined by the number of obstacles cleared, and the time taken to clear them.

Heat

Individuals or teams compete in a series of heats, with teams being removed incrementally after a set number of heats is completed, or when a set number of heats has been won.

International

Groups of 4-7 competitors from around the world compete in teams to determine the best country. Typical formats have teams getting eliminated after each stage, based on heats which contain one member of each team.

Military only / police only

A format unique to Indonesia. Competitors are grouped into three teams based on their police or military unit. Competitors complete the course as normal, with a running total of how many clear for each team. Unlike all other formats, competitors must clear both the qualifier and the semifinals to advance to the finals.

Pair

A format where two competitors run the course at the same time in two lanes. Each lane has different obstacles, and in some cases one competitor must complete a task to unblock the other lane.

Pentathlon

A variant of the original format aiming to close the gap between Ninja Warrior, and the obstacle racing debuting in the Modern pentathlon at the 2028 Summer Olympics. Stages include aspects of Fencing and Laser-run not previously seen in any Ninja Warrior series, as well as an increase focus on swimming, which has only appeared in some adaptations of Ninja Warrior.[29]

Racing

Two competitors race head-to-head over several heats to determine a winner. This format was seen in the semifinals of many international shows, all rounds of Ninja Warrior UK season 6 and Ninja Warrior Poland season 10 onward, as well as the finals of American Ninja Warrior season 17.

Senior only

A scaled down version of Sasuke for individuals over the age of 55.

Strongman

This group of shows follows the normal Ninja Warrior format, with obstacles focused on weightlifting skills, similar to Strongman competitions.

Trial

A single stage course.

Women only

A modified version of Ninja Warrior that features only female competitors. In Japan, the format followed the original format of the show, whereas other countries make it operate more like qualifying rounds with guaranteed advancement to each stage.

Winners around the world

Below is a complete list of competitors to achieve Total Victory. Winners are assumed to be of the nationality of their respective show unless otherwise marked. When a season has multiple winners, order is determined by the order shown during broadcast. All results are taken from their respective television broadcasts. Total Victory is achieved only when a competitor completes all stages of the original tournament format of a Ninja Warrior course. Any series with a guaranteed winner is not considered eligible for this title.

The number of times that a competitor achieved Total Victory.

Total victories during regular seasons

As of 2025, there have been a total of 35 Total Victories achieved by 29 individuals.

Of wins to date, the United States and France have had 7, Japan has had 6, Israel has had 4, Vietnam and Australia have had 3, and Germany has had 2.

To date, only three competitors have achieved Total Victory outside their home country: David Campbell, Joel Mattli and Rene Casselly.

Only six individuals have achieved Total Victory twice: Yuuji Urushihara, Yusuke Morimoto, Clement Gravier, Yogev Malka, Vance Walker and Rene Casselly.

Rene Casselly is the only competitor to have achieved Total Victory in two different international versions.

Total victory during women's only regular seasons

Other notable results

Women's finals buzzers

Throughout Ninja Warrior history, it is not relatively common for women to hit buzzers due to the relative advantage men have in mixed-gender sports. There have been over 100 buzzers by women during qualifiers and 40 during semifinals, buzzers on the finals course are still quite rare. Buzzers marked as EX indicate a buzzer on a finals course that occurred during a special outside a main season, which had removed or modified the time limits.

There have been a total of 48 finals buzzers by 18 women. Of these, Jessie Graff and Olivia Vivian have each hit 8, Steffanie Edelmann and Jesse Labreck have hit 5, Addy Herman and Maurane Jelic have hit 3, and Isabella Folsom, Beth Lodge and Viktoria Kramer have hit 2.

This run would have cleared in the corresponding regular season this special aired in

alt name	Sasuke
genre	Sports entertainment Obstacle course
creator	Masato Inui
director	Ushio Higuchi (1997–2011) Masato Inui (1997–2005, 2012–present)
num episodes	191 seasons
list episodes	List of Ninja Warrior seasons
first aired	September 27, 1997
last aired	present

History

1997–2006: Sasuke and Kunoichi

2007–2019: international expansion

Format

Course structure

Preliminary Rounds

First stage

Ninja Warrior around the world

See also

External links

References

2019–2025: format variations, COVID-19 and IOC certification

2025–present: franchise reboots

Second stage

Third stage

Final stage

Racing

Core installments

Spin-off series and specials

Format definitions

Bracket

Dogs

Elimination

Heat

International

Military only / police only

Pair

Pentathlon

Racing

Senior only

Strongman

Trial

Women only

Bracket

Dogs

Elimination

Heat

International

Military only / police only

Pair

Pentathlon

Racing

Senior only

Strongman

Trial

Women only

Winners around the world

Total victories during regular seasons

Total victory during women's only regular seasons

Total victories during regular seasons

Total victory during women's only regular seasons

Total victory during kids regular seasons

Total victory during Super Dog

Other notable results

Women's finals buzzers

Women's finals buzzers

Total victory during kids regular seasons

Total victory during Super Dog