Danielle Kelly has just signed a European contract with Polaris that begins in 2026 and extends across multiple matches. This is the first announcement that the promotion has made ready for next year and it’s a big one for their female roster. Kelly is one of the top female competitors in the sport and she’s also one of the most popular. She’s always had a pretty big following in Jiu-Jitsu but that shot up when she joined ONE Championship in 2022. That’s when she became one of the promotion’s most important figures in their women’s divisions, even becoming their first female champion.
Kelly won the inaugural atomweight title at ONE Fight Night 14 and joined a very small selection of grapplers who have ever reached that point for the promotion. She later lost the title in her first defense against Mayssa Bastos, but she will always hold a key piece of history as their first female champion. Her relationship with ONE Championship clearly started out very positively but it later turned out to be one that didn’t really work for her, as they were unable to find her opponents regularly enough. She eventually asked for them to release her from her contract, and the promotion obliged.
This move to Polaris will be a new chapter for Danielle Kelly and it’s a big opportunity for her to get high-level matches very regularly. Not only do Polaris have several female weight classes with active champions but they also stage multiple events a year, giving her the chance to face some of the best competitors in the world. Then the added benefit that Polaris have over ONE Championship is that Kelly will still be free to compete for other promotions outside of Europe. Historically, even Polaris’ champions have been able to take matches on other major events like Who’s Number One.
Polaris announced the news that Danielle Kelly had signed a European contract with them in a recent post to their official Instagram account:
