← All articles · Thailand · 23 November 2025

Bangkok, Thailand: Front row at Rajadamnern for a full Muay Thai fight night

Front row at Rajadamnern Stadium for RWS 162: seven professional Muay Thai bouts, a new bantamweight champion, and a betting crowd that makes the night.

Rajadamnern is the world's first purpose-built Muay Thai stadium and still one of the most prestigious places on earth to fight. We got front row seats for RWS 162, close enough to hear every kick land, and filmed four hours of it.

Muay Thai fight night at Rajadamnern Stadium, Bangkok. Watch on YouTube

This isn't a tourist show. It's a serious Rajadamnern World Series fight night with legal betting in the stands and a card streamed worldwide through the official RWS partners on YouTube and DAZN. The modern format mixes the stadium's history with big production: open scoring after every round, elite fighters from Thailand and around the world, and a betting crowd that gives the night a completely different energy.

The card

Seven professional bouts, and barely a dull minute. The fight of the night for us was China's Liao Shixu against New Zealand's Jason Khun, three wild rounds of heavy hands and brutal kicks that ended in a majority draw. Pure chaos, in the best way.

The biggest fight of the card was also the first female bout: Brazil's Barbara Aguiar against compatriot Maria Eduarda over five intense rounds for the Rajadamnern Stadium bantamweight title, with Aguiar announced as the new champion. Thai fighters Petchthongchai, Saenphon and Karaked rounded out a card that ran from tactical chess matches to all-out wars.

If Bangkok is on your itinerary and you want to see the national sport as locals see it, RWS runs every Saturday night, seven three-round bouts plus a five-round title fight. Sit close if you can. You don't just watch Muay Thai at Rajadamnern; you feel it through the floor.

Fight night in stills

The camera came out between rounds. From the empty ring at the start of the evening to the marquee out on the street at closing time, this is how the night looked from row one.

Selfie of Inga and Dileep beside the empty Rajadamnern ring before the fights, white searchlights crossing above the red RWS corner posts — Front row, ring empty, lights doing laps of the ceiling. Half an hour to go.

Two male Muay Thai fighters mid-exchange in the ring at Rajadamnern Stadium, one throwing a punch, sweat flying, the referee stepping in behind them — Liao Shixu against Jason Khun on the prelims: three rounds of pure chaos, and a majority draw at the end of it.

Two Muay Thai fighters squaring up in the ring, one in red and white RWS shorts with blue star-patterned gloves, seen through the ropes — Reading each other on the main card. Muay Thai spends a lot of the first round just looking.

Cornermen in red vests working on a seated fighter's leg through the ropes at the red corner post between rounds — Sixty seconds in the corner: water, ice, oil, and a very fast opinion about the next round.

Two female Muay Thai fighters clashing in the ring, one throwing a knee, with a screen behind reading Rajadamnern female bantamweight — The women's bantamweight title fight, five rounds and the biggest fight of the card.

Inga giving a thumbs up beside a smiling female Muay Thai fighter with a cut above her eyebrow, ringside at Rajadamnern Stadium — Ringside moments after the final bell. She had just been to war and was still smiling.

Inga giving a thumbs up next to a man in a black tuxedo and bow tie in the red-lit foyer of Rajadamnern Stadium — On the way out, alongside comfortably the best-dressed man in the building.

Dileep and Inga posing with a Muay Thai fighter under the marquee lights of the Rajadamnern Stadium ticket hall — One more with a fighter on the way out, under the lights of a stadium running since 1945.

The illuminated Rajadamnern Stadium marquee at night with Thai and English lettering, crowds and parked motorbikes spilling into the street below — Chucking-out time. The sign under the marquee calls it the world's first Muay Thai stadium, and it isn't bragging.

We walked out onto Ratchadamnoen Nok Road at midnight with our ears still ringing. If you only do one night out in Bangkok, make it this one.

More from this trip is on the Bangkok story, and the rest of Thailand is under Thailand.

There’s more from this trip on our YouTube channel, we film the real sights and sounds, no fluff. You’ll also find us on TikTok and Instagram.