close
The new global benchmark for ranking the world’s best racehorses
Where Experts & Fans Rank The World's Best Racehorses
The Idol Horse Rankings are category-based ‘Top 10’ lists that present a new way of ranking the world’s best racehorses, combining the authority of international horse racing experts with the knowledge of Idol Horse’s global army of informed racing fans.
These rankings reflect current form and global context, not just official ratings or prize money, and are designed to fuel global racing conversation and spotlight elite performance, wherever it happens.
Idol Horse Rankings are not ratings: we present an alternative to the limitations of other racehorse rankings, which rank by peak performance.
The Idol Horse Rankings are overseen by the Idol Horse Rankings Commissioner, who also has a seat on the Expert Panel. The Rankings Commissioner can announce new rounds of voting, and can add or remove horses to particular categories at their discretion.
Towards the end of each calendar year, a final vote will be conducted to determine that year’s Idol Horse Champion in each category, and an overall champion: the Idol Horse of the Year.
The panel is comprised of a core team of three international horse racing experts with decades of experience reporting on and analysing multiple jurisdictions. At times, guest world racing experts may also be granted a ‘one-off’ seat on the panel.
The Idol Horse Experts approach their rankings with their own methodology.
When selecting their Top 10 Lists, our panel will consider:
Recent form & quality of opposition;
Grade/Group 1 performance;
Consistency or standout brilliance;
Context and impact: is this horse’s performance turning heads around the world?
X-factor: does this horse have that special ‘something’, even if it is yet to achieve its full potential?
You most certainly can! In addition to the Expert Vote, we also conduct a Fan Vote. Through Idol Horse’s reporting and original multi-jurisdictional storytelling, we have rapidly built the most distinctive, wide-ranging and knowledgable audience in world racing, offering a truly global perspective on the sport.
Opening up Idol Horse Rankings to our readers allows that collective wisdom to directly influence our official rankings: the Expert’s Top 10s are combined with the Fan Vote to form the Official Idol Horse Rankings, published periodically on idolhorse.com and across our social platforms.
Voting in Idol Horse Rankings also helps earn points to unlock unique avatars depicting champion racehorses of the past, on your Idol Horse user profile.
You can choose to vote in as many categories as you like (earning more points for more votes submitted).
You may only vote once per category during a specific voting window.
We have separated the world’s best horses into the following categories (note some more versatile horses will appear across multiple categories):
Sprinters (Turf): 1399 metres and below
Milers (Turf): 1400 metres to 1799 metres
Mid-Distance (Turf): 1800 metres to 2299 metres
Stayers (Turf): 2300m+
Speed (Dirt): 1699 metres and below
Classic (Dirt): 1700 metres and above
Overall (Pound-For-Pound ‘Top 10’): All categories and surfaces combined: who are the 10 best horses in the world?
Stay tuned for all categories to be launched in February 2026.
The Experts and Fans will submit their personal Top 10 in ranked order: 1st (top-ranked) to 10th, according to the categories under consideration.
Points are assigned: 10 points for 1st, 9 for 2nd, down to 1 point for 10th.
All votes are ‘normalized’ to give equal weight to the Expert’s Vote (50%) and Fan Vote (50%)
The Fan Vote counts for 50% of the Official Idol Horse Rankings list formation, therefore offering a powerful dual perspective by combining expert opinion with ‘people power’.
Voting Windows will open after all major global racing events (e.g. HKIR, Dubai World Cup, Royal Ascot, Breeders’ Cup, etc.), or at the discretion of the Idol Horse Rankings Commissioner.
A new round of voting will commence with the publication of the Expert Vote, with the Fan Vote to then operate for a designated number of days after that.
At the closure of the Fan Vote voting window, the expert and fan votes are combined, and that round of Rankings is listed as ‘Final’.
Retired or deceased horses will either be allowed to remain in the Rankings database for the duration of that year, or will be removed as voting options. This decision will be at the discretion of the Idol Horse Rankings Commissioner.
For example, a horse retired in June 2025 may still be eligible to be Ranked in 2025, depending on its achievements and standing in that calendar year. However, it would not be eligible to be ranked in 2026.
Subscribe to the idol horse newsletter
New to Idol Horse? Sign Up
By continuing, you are agreeing to the User Agreement and acknowledge that you understand the Privacy Policy.