Women's 100 metres hurdles world record progression

The women's 100 metres hurdles is an outdoor track event over a distance of 100 metres with ten hurdles at the height of 83.8 cm (33 inches).^[1] The event superseded the women's 80 metres hurdles.^[2] The world records of the women's 100 metres hurdles have been recognised by World Athletics (called the International Association of Athletics Federations until 2019) since 1969.^[3] Every world record undergoes a ratification process that includes a wind assistance check and doping control.^[4]

Initially, 100 metres hurdles races were hand-timed to the tenth of a second. Some races were also fully automatically timed to the hundredth of a second in addition to the hand timing. In 1975–77, World Athletics accepted separate fully automatically timed records for this event, but no new world records were set in that period. From 1977, World Athletics required fully automatic timing for all races of this event, which lead to the recognition of a slower time as the new world record.^[5]

Twenty-three world records in this event have been recognised by World Athletics, of which four were equalling the then-current world record. Nine records were set by athletes from East Germany, five by athletes from Poland, five by athletes from Bulgaria, and four by athletes from other nations. The first hand-timed world record of 13.3 seconds was set by Karin Balzer of East Germany in 1969. Balzer has set a total of six world records in this event, more than any other athlete. The last hand-timed world record of 12.3 seconds was set by Annelie Ehrhardt of East Germany in 1973. In 1977, the first recognised fully automatically timed world record became the time of 12.59 seconds set by Ehrhardt in 1972. The longest-standing world record of 12.21 seconds was set by Yordanka Donkova of Bulgaria in 1988 and stood for almost 28 years until 2016. The current world record of 12.12 seconds was set by Tobi Amusan of Nigera in 2022.^[6]