Now in its 29th year, the ranking highlights the leaders commanding boardrooms, markets, and industries. And for the first time since 2024, we have a new No. 1.
Citigroup chair and CEO Jane Fraser has ascended to the top spot, five years after she got Citi’s corner office. Fraser broke Wall Street’s glass ceiling when she became the first woman CEO of a major bank in 2021. Her rise exemplifies how this list tracks not just who has an impressive title, but what they are doing with it—with hard business metrics to back that up. (Last year’s No. 1, GM chief Mary Barra, is at No. 2 this year.)
The women on this list are leaders at 94 companies with a combined 11.8 million employees and $7.3 trillion in annual revenue. They hold 180 board seats and work across 20 countries and territories. (Behind the U.S., the countries with the highest number of Most Powerful Women listees are China, with nine, and France and the U.K., with six each.)
The tech and finance industries dominate, but women are breaking through in other sectors, too—among them BP’s Meg O’Neill (No. 16), Big Oil’s first female CEO, and Latriece Watkins (No. 87), the new CEO of Sam’s Club. We chose these executives based on the size and health of their businesses or P&Ls, measured by both 12-month and three-year financial data. Plus, we evaluated their influence, innovation, career trajectories, and efforts to make business better.
