Diesel AK Blog

Fighter Profile: Alexandre Pantoja

Alexandre Pantoja: former UFC flyweight champion — record, grappling and the injury title loss.

Fighters13 July 2026

Background

Brazilian flyweight from Rio de Janeiro, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt and former UFC flyweight champion. His professional record is 30-6, with 14 wins in the UFC.

Career timeline

Won the UFC flyweight championship in July 2023 and defended it four times, beating Brandon Royval, Steve Erceg, Kai Asakura and Kai Kara-France.
Lost the title to Joshua Van at UFC 323 on 6 December 2025, a TKO by injury at 0:26 of round one: Van caught his head-kick attempt and Pantoja injured his arm as he tumbled to the canvas.
Initially indicated he would not be ready to return until around June 2026. No bout has been announced as of 1 August 2026, though a rematch with Van has been widely discussed.

Fight craft

Pantoja is a relentless grappler who chases the back better than anyone at 125lb — his combination of pace, scrambling ability and rear-naked choke finishing has decided most of his best wins. He is also a durable, aggressive striker who is happy in a firefight. His limitation is size: he gives up reach in most matchups and has to take risks to close distance, and his title reign was built on winning wild fights rather than controlling them.

In the modern MMA landscape

Our wider MMA analysis says Pantoja’s title loss came “due to an arm injury sustained during a blistering striking exchange”. The reported mechanism is more specific and more unlucky: Van caught his kick and he was injured in the fall, 26 seconds into the fight. It was a championship lost to an accident rather than to an exchange.

Return to What the Modern MMA Game Demands.

Sources

Record and competitive status checked 1 August 2026.