The ROH World Championship is a professional wrestling world championship created and promoted by Ring of Honor (ROH). It is considered the most prestigious title in the promotion. The current champion is Claudio Castagnoli, who is in his second reign. The title is currently defended on All Elite Wrestling's television programs (AEW being co-owned by ROH owner Tony Khan), as well as ROH pay-per-view events. History Low Ki defeated Spanky, Christopher Daniels, and Doug Williams in a 60-minute Iron Man match to become the inaugural ROH Champion at Crowning a Champion on July 27, 2002 after holding its first tournament to crown the inaugural champion on June 22, 2002. Samoa Joe had the longest title reign to date when he held the belt for 21 months and four days. During his reign, ROH held a cross-promotional show with Frontier Wrestling Alliance in the United Kingdom on May 17, 2003, called Frontiers of Honor. At that show, Joe turned the title into the ROH World Championship when he defended it against The Zebra Kid. Since then the title has been defended in Germany, Canada, Switzerland, Austria, Mexico, Japan, Ireland, Italy, and Spain. On August 12, 2006, the ROH Pure Championship was unified with the ROH World Championship after the ROH Pure Champion Nigel McGuinness lost to the ROH World Champion Bryan Danielson in Liverpool, England in a title unification match. The match was contested under pure wrestling rules, with the stipulation that both championships could be lost by disqualification or count out. In 2010, the title belt, along with the ROH World Tag Team Championship belts, was redesigned. The new belt has an eagle with its wings spread over a picture of the world with an ROH logo on the top. This design also includes various flags on different countries. In December 2012, a new design was introduced at the Final Battle iPPV. On July 3, 2013, the ROH World Championship has declared vacant for the first time since its inception, when ROH Match Maker Nigel McGuinness stripped then-champion Jay Briscoe of the title after he was sidelined with a storyline injury and would be unable to compete for the foreseeable future. In December 2017, ROH unveiled another new design for the title belt, which debuted at Final Battle. In late 2021, ROH announced it would go on hiatus following Final Battle. Then-ROH World Champion Bandido was supposed to wrestle Jonathan