Robert Whittaker is planning his return to the UFC octagon, but it won’t be for a while.
Whittaker is coming off a rough two fight losing streak. He had his front teeth snapped off his jaw by Khamzat Chimaev
in October 2024 and then lost a split decision to Reinier de Ridder in July 2025. Those defeats have dropped him out of middleweight title contention, so what is the 35 year old former champ going to do now?
According to “The Reaper,” he may move up another weight class.
“I want to get back in there next year,” Whittaker said on his MMA Arcade podcast. “I don’t know how I want to do it. I’ll be working on some new skill sets and working on some new things. Wanna get in there probably by mid-next year. I don’t know if it will be at middleweight.”
Whittaker confirmed he was considering light heavyweight, which would be two divisions up from welterweight, where he competed from 2009-2014.
“Potentially,” he added. “I’m a bigger guy now. But everyone’s gonna say, ‘Oh, he’s too short, too short. They’re taller than me here! What’s the difference? You know what I mean? Everyone’s got height on me anyway. Everyone’s got reach on me anyway. What’s the difference?”
“I think I might as well just try something else, you know? I don’t know, thinking about playing with the idea, but that is Next Year Rob’s problem.”
We’d file this idea under trying to fix a problem that isn’t a problem. Loses to Chimaev and de Ridder don’t justify a move, considering Chimaev is champion and de Ridder is likely to bust into the top 5 in 2026. This isn’t to say Whittaker couldn’t move up to light heavyweight and do some good work. But he’d have just as much trouble with the top 5 at 205 as he would 185.
At least he’d be allowed to eat, and that must make the idea pretty tempting.
