What is Muhammad Ali's record?

56–5 in boxing. That is the aggregate stated in the English Wikipedia infobox; the results table on the same article lists 59 bouts individually.

Does a no contest change a record here?

No. A no contest is not a win, a loss or a draw, and it is never folded into one. It is counted and printed separately, so a 20–0 record with two no contests is shown as exactly that rather than as 22–0 or as 20–0 with the no contests dropped. The same applies to a bout overturned after the fact where the source records the change.

What happens when sources disagree about a fight?

This site publishes one source — the fighter's English Wikipedia article, read on the date printed under every table — and it does not silently reconcile that against anyone else's database. Where the article's own infobox total and its own results table disagree, both are shown and the page says which one each figure came from. Nothing is averaged, and no field is filled in from a second source to make a total balance.

Muhammad Ali — record, reach and career in context

Boxing record

56–5

Muhammad Ali has a reach of 78″ against a height of 75″ — a reach advantage of +3.99%, average for heavyweight boxing and the 49th percentile of the 317 compared here.

WON ABOVE·LOST BELOW BAR = STOPPAGE·BROKEN BAR = SUBMISSION·TICK = DECISION 1960–1981

SOURCE·Muhammad Ali — English Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)·derived figures computed here·REVIEWED 2026-07-29

How this record is compiled

Measurements come from the fighter's English Wikipedia infobox; the bout list is parsed from the results table on the same article, read on 2026-07-29. Boxing tables are read by header name and MMA records by the fixed column order of the MMA record template — two different parsers, because reading MMA rows as a boxing table returns a fighter's boxing record in place of their real one.
A bout enters the ledger with whatever fields the source states: result, opponent, method, round, year. Any field the source leaves empty stays empty here. A date that cannot be established is left blank rather than inferred, and the bout is still counted.
A no contest is counted and printed as a no contest. It is never folded into the wins, the losses or the draws, and it never disappears to make a total balance.
Where the article's infobox total disagrees with its own results table, both figures are published and each is labelled with where it came from. Nothing is averaged and nothing is reconciled against a second database.
Percentiles rank this fighter among the 317 heavyweight boxing fighters in the dataset — the most specific group of at least 30 that this fighter belongs to.

reach advantage = (reach − height) ÷ height × 100

Sources, exclusions and known limits →

Bout record

Every bout the article's own results table lists, in order. A dash is a field the source leaves empty — it is not a zero and it is not a guess.

Bout-by-bout recordAUG 2026
Year	Result	Opponent	Method	Rd
1981	L	Trevor Berbick	Decision	10
1980	L	Larry Holmes	KO/TKO	10
1978	W	Leon Spinks	Decision	15
1977	W	Earnie Shavers	Decision	15
1977	W	Alfredo Evangelista	Decision	15
1976	W	Ken Norton	Decision	15
1976	W	Richard Dunn	KO/TKO	5
1976	W	Jimmy Young	Decision	15
1976	W	Jean-Pierre Coopman	KO/TKO	5
1975	W	Joe Frazier	KO/TKO	14
1975	W	Joe Bugner	Decision	15
1975	W	Ron Lyle	KO/TKO	11
1975	W	Chuck Wepner	KO/TKO	15
1974	W	George Foreman	KO/TKO	8
1974	W	Joe Frazier	Decision	12
1973	W	Rudie Lubbers	Decision	12
1973	W	Ken Norton	Decision	12
1973	W	Joe Bugner	Decision	12
1972	W	Bob Foster	KO/TKO	8
1972	W	Floyd Patterson	KO/TKO	7
1972	W	Alvin Lewis	KO/TKO	11
1972	W	Jerry Quarry	KO/TKO	7
1972	W	George Chuvalo	Decision	12
1972	W	Mac Foster	Decision	15
1971	W	Jürgen Blin	KO/TKO	7
1971	W	Buster Mathis	Decision	12
1971	W	Jimmy Ellis	KO/TKO	12
1971	L	Joe Frazier	Decision	15
1970	W	Oscar Bonavena	KO/TKO	15
1970	W	Jerry Quarry	KO/TKO	3
1967	W	Zora Folley	KO/TKO	7
1967	W	Ernie Terrell	Decision	15
1966	W	Cleveland Williams	KO/TKO	3
1966	W	Karl Mildenberger	KO/TKO	12
1966	W	Brian London	KO/TKO	3
1966	W	Henry Cooper	KO/TKO	6
1966	W	George Chuvalo	Decision	15
1965	W	Floyd Patterson	KO/TKO	12
1965	W	Sonny Liston	KO/TKO	1
1964	W	Sonny Liston	KO/TKO	6
1963	W	Henry Cooper	KO/TKO	5
1963	W	Doug Jones	Decision	10
1963	W	Charlie Powell	KO/TKO	3
1962	W	Archie Moore	KO/TKO	4
1962	W	Alejandro Lavorante	KO/TKO	5
1962	W	Billy Daniels	KO/TKO	7
1962	W	George Logan	KO/TKO	4
1962	W	Don Warner	KO/TKO	4
1962	W	Sonny Banks	KO/TKO	4
1961	W	Willi Besmanoff	KO/TKO	7
1961	W	Alex Miteff	KO/TKO	6
1961	W	Alonzo Johnson	Decision	10
1961	W	Duke Sabedong	Decision	10
1961	W	LaMar Clark	KO/TKO	2
1961	W	Donnie Fleeman	—	6
1961	W	Jim Robinson	—	1
1961	W	Tony Esperti	KO/TKO	3
1960	W	Herb Siler	—	4
1960	W	Tunney Hunsaker	—	6

45 of these opponents have their own page here.

SOURCE·Muhammad Ali — English Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)·derived figures computed here·REVIEWED 2026-07-29

Reach in context

Reach advantage

+3.99%

78″ reach on a 75″ frame

lowestmedianhighest

Compared against 317 heavyweight boxing fighters. Median 3.99%.

-2.8%heavyweight boxing reach advantage12%

Measurements
Reach	78″ (198.1 cm)	53rd pct
Height	75″ (190.5 cm)	57th pct
Stance	Orthodox
Division	Heavyweight Boxing
Most active decade	1960s — 29 of 59 dated bouts
Country	United States

Record

Boxing record

56–5

61 bouts on record

Finish rate

66%

of wins ended inside the distance — heavyweight boxing median 68%, 46th percentile

By knockout 66%
By decision 34%

The career, bout by bout

59 recorded bouts from 1960 to 1981. Every incumbent shows this as a table you have to read; here it is as a shape you can see.

winlossdraw / NC1960–1981

Career span

22y

1960–1981

Longest unbeaten run

34

without a loss — draws do not break it

Busiest year

1961

8 bouts

Recorded bouts

59

59 with a date

Closest in build

heavyweight boxing fighters with the nearest reach advantage.

Standing questions

What this record does and does not say

What is Muhammad Ali's record?: 56–5 in boxing. That is the aggregate stated in the English Wikipedia infobox; the results table on the same article lists 59 bouts individually.
Does a no contest change a record here?: No. A no contest is not a win, a loss or a draw, and it is never folded into one. It is counted and printed separately, so a 20–0 record with two no contests is shown as exactly that rather than as 22–0 or as 20–0 with the no contests dropped. The same applies to a bout overturned after the fact where the source records the change.
What happens when sources disagree about a fight?: This site publishes one source — the fighter's English Wikipedia article, read on the date printed under every table — and it does not silently reconcile that against anyone else's database. Where the article's own infobox total and its own results table disagree, both are shown and the page says which one each figure came from. Nothing is averaged, and no field is filled in from a second source to make a total balance.

Cross-references

Heavyweight boxing

The 605 heavyweight boxing fighters this record is ranked against, and the distribution Ali sits inside.

605 FIGHTERS 1960s boxing

29 of these bouts fall in the 1960s. This is what the rest of that decade's records look like.

72 FIGHTERS Doug Jones vs Muhammad Ali

A bout both records confirm — set out side by side, with every opponent the two men have in common.

1966 Longest unbeaten runs

Muhammad Ali went 34 without a loss. This is where that sits against every run on the site.

LEADERBOARD