Checking in With America's Next Top Model Winners: Who Is Still on Top?

Checking in With America's Next Top Model Winners: Who Is Still on Top? 

Yes, we were all rooting for them. But did Adrienne Curry and the rest of the champs Tyra Banks hand-picked to compete on her long-running series America's Next Top Model really come out on top? 

When Tyra Banks looks back at her time helming America's Next Top Model, she can't help but smize.

 

Make no mistake, the supermodel understands not everyone was rooting for her throughout all 24 seasons (sorry, cycles) of the competition series that saw her teach the art of the smize, the booty touch and, most importantly, how to build a career in fashion akin to hers. 

"Over 20 years ago I created a show called America’s Next Top Model," the three-time Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover model detailed while accepting the Luminary Spotlight honor at February's ESSENCE Black Women in Hollywood Awards. "And you guys have no idea how hard we fought to bring the diversity to that television show at a time when it didn’t exist."

The challenge, continued the 52-year-old, was "to show different beauties at a time when the world was like, 'What? You casting that?'" she recounted. "I was like, 'Why can the girl from the trailer park become a supermodel but the girl that's chillin' in the park in the hood can't?' And we fought and we struggled and we made it happen."

That being said, "Did we get it right?" she questioned. "Hell no. I said some dumb s--t."

Among her regrets was the famed race-switching challenge that saw some models pose with darkened skin. "Been seeing the posts about the insensitivity of some past ANTM moments and I agree with you," Banks tweeted in 2020. "Looking back, those were some really off choices. Appreciate your honest feedback and am sending so much love and virtual hugs." 

Though she also has her own observations. 

Despite the missteps and the hard-to-shake criticism that most of her champs didn't reach the upper echelons of the industry "I refuse to have my legacy be about some stuff linked together on the internet when there were 24 cycles of changing the world," Banks, who handed out the photos for 23 out of 24 seasons as host, explained in February. "And I am so excited that I, and so many of us, have opened that door for others to follow."

And though it's been more than seven years since she was last holding just one photo in her hands, Banks is hopeful she hasn't delivered her last critique. 

"We have tried, so it's not us," she told E! News in 2024 of her efforts to get her brainchild back on the air. "It's the powers that be. I'm not the biggest boss in the room, so it's not my doing. Maybe one day."

When the reality series premiered 22-plus years ago in May 2003, first on the now-defunct UPN, then The CW and, finally, VH1, it dominated, at one point netting upwards of 6 million viewers eager to watch wannabe cover girls sob through their pixie cut "Ty-over" and attempt to nail the perfect commercial for Covergirl's LashBlast Mascara.

"I didn't realize that Top Model would be one of the most successful television shows in the history of television," Banks admitted to E! "Never. I thought it would be two seasons and that it. So big, big surprise."

And she remains proud of how they moved the needle within the modeling industry.

"I think it's legendary because it opened the door for so much before diversity was a thing that people had to do because of the pressure of social media," she explained. "We were doing things that people would poo-poo, or go, 'Why are you doing that?' And, 'That person is not traditionally beautiful.' So we got a lot of backlash, a lot, for breaking down those doors. But sometimes when you're early in first, you get the bumps and bruises and you open the door for other people to come."

And, for the most part, each winner did go on to have a relatively fruitful career, whether that meant posing for brands such as Burberry and Guess, walking Off-White runways or finding their way in front of other TV cameras. 

Let's take a look into where the victors landed after they claimed their spot on top.