Top-20 Women’s Swimmers in the World, Part 3: Americans and Australians Reach Top-10
At the recent World Championships, swimmers competed for medals in 42 pool events, and the results clearly show the best swimmer in the world for each race. Comparing swimmers across events is a subjective task, with factors including versatility, dominance, longevity, big-race performance and relay contributions all considered. With the summer competition season concluded, we will again try to stack up the various competitors from one through 20.
These rankings will be based largely on performances at the World Championships but results from other meets will be considered. Swimmers who sat out this year’s major competitions will not be included on this list.
10. Meg Harris, Australia
Meg Harris — Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr / Swimming Australia
Harris has become an entrenched sprint star in the four years since making her international debut alongside McKeon and legendary sisters Cate and Bronte Campbell on the gold-medal-winning 400 free relay in Tokyo. Harris, now 23, collected her fifth World Championships gold on opening night in Singapore. She split 51.87 in the 400 free relay team, the second-quickest split in the race, and Australia needed every inch to hold off the United States.
A week later, Harris won gold in the 50 free. Her trek toward elite status in the event began in 2022, when she tied for World Championships bronze, and she was the silver medalist last year in Paris, with only Swedish legend Sarah Sjostrom getting the better of her. This time, with Sjostrom out of action preparing to give birth to her first child, Harris took advantage and stormed to gold in 24.02. Her winning margin was 0.24, a huge advantage in a race as short as the 50 free.
9. Torri Huske, United States
Torri Huske — Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
Coming in this slot is a swimmer whose lone individual medal at the World Championships was a bronze; the other 19 swimmers making the cutoff for this list all earned at least one individual silver. But Huske is a far more capable swimmer than she demonstrated in Singapore, when she was dealing with the effects of a gastrointestinal illness. She was forced to skip the 100 fly, an event in which she is the reigning Olympic champion, and she fell to sixth in the 50 free. However, Huske put forth a gutty effort in the 100 free final, going out fast and holding off Milou van Wijk by two hundredths for bronze.
More indicative of her talent are her current world rankings for 2025, first in the 100 free and second in the 50 free, plus her long-term record that includes the sustained international success in the 100 fly and now 14 medals at the World Championships. Huske added three relay medals at this year’s meet, silver with the American women’s 400 free relay team plus golds in the mixed 400 free relay and women’s 400 medley relay, both in world-record time.
8. Lani Pallister, Australia
Lani Pallister — Photo Courtesy Delly Carr / Swimming Australia
In her first final of the World Championships, Pallister became the fastest non-podium finisher ever in the 400 free, clocking 3:58.87 but just missing the medals thanks to the efforts of Summer McIntosh, Li Bingjie and Katie Ledecky. But she would rebound to collect one medal of each color in Singapore, culminating in an 800 free where she crashed a highly-anticipated showdown between McIntosh and Ledecky. Pallister never lost touch with the two favorites, and down the stretch, she was the closest to competitor to Ledecky. The Aussie clocked 8:05.98 to win silver, crushing her best time by five seconds and moving to No. 3 all-time in the event.
Pallister also won silver in the 1500 free after sticking with Ledecky in the early stages of the event, and she led off Australia’s gold-medal-winning 800 free relay. Previously, Pallister’s biggest accomplishments had been sweeping the 400, 800 and 1500 free at the 2022 Short Course World Championships and overcoming COVID-19 to help Australia win relay gold in Paris, but now, she ranks in the top-five performers in history in the three longest freestyle events.
7. Mollie O’Callaghan, Australia
Mollie O’Callaghan — Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr /Swimming Australia
O’Callaghan has shared the Aussie spotlight with legendary freestylers such as Cate Campbell, Emma McKeon and Ariarne Titmus, not to mention dominating backstroker Kaylee McKeown, but she has carved out a strong run of success in the 100 and 200 freestyle over the past four years. She was the world champion in the 100 free in 2022 and 2023, but the 200-meter race has become O’Callaghan’s specialty, with gold medals at major competitions each of the past three summers.
After edging out Titmus at the 2023 Worlds and 2024 Olympics, this year’s win was a bit more comfortable, with O’Callaghan pulling away for gold by more than a second. Her Singapore haul also included gold medals in the 400 and 800 free relays plus silvers in the 100 free and 400 medley relay, bringing her career haul to 17 World Championship medals despite only racing at three editions of the meet thus far. While O’Callaghan’s individual success is Hall-of-Fame-worthy on its own, her freestyle relay consistency is the primary reason Australia continue to dominate those events.
6. Regan Smith, United States
Regan Smith — Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
Individual gold medals have evaded Smith at recent major competitions even though she continues to pop off elite times every time she races in a major final. The 2023 Worlds brought three silver medals in the backstroke events, finishing behind McKeown on every occasion. At last year’s Paris Olympics, McKeown was too good in the 100 and 200 back while Smith came up just short in the 200 fly despite giving McIntosh everything the young Canadian could handle. This year, Smith was the runnerup on four occasions, behind McKeown in the 100 and 200 back, McIntosh in the 200 fly and American teammate Katharine Berkoff in the 50 back.
Yes, that is 10 individual silver medals for Smith at major competitions in the last three years. However, the 23-year-old was one of only two swimmers (along with McIntosh) to win four or more individual medals in Singapore, and she swam season-best times in each of her finals. At meet’s end, Smith beat McKeown leading off the women’s 400 medley relay to lead the Americans to gold and a world record. Not a bad follow-up to a year when she captured five Olympic medals and then swept the backstroke events at the Short Course World Championships, with world records in all three. Smith’s haul from Singapore brings her career total of Worlds medals to 14.
