Miss Universe makes a historic change to its age limit rule for contestants

In what could be termed as a historic move, the Miss Universe organisation has announced that adult women of all ages will be allowed to compete in their pageants.Miss Universe 2022 R’Bonney Gabriel announced the groundbreaking change during Tanner Fletcher’s show at New York Fashion Week on Tuesday. The change will officially take place in 2024.

The news was also shared in an Instagram story on the official page of Miss Universe.

“Starting then, every adult woman in the world will be eligible to compete to be Miss Universe,” they wrote.

So far women up to the age of 28 were allowed to take part in the beauty pageant. Gabriel was the oldest woman to be crowned Miss Universe and is now 29 years old. Now any woman of 18 or above will be able to participate in the pageant.

Gabriel was also the first Filipino-American woman to win Miss USA — and the first Miss USA representative to be crowned Miss Universe in a decade.

“What I love about Miss Universe is that they are always out first in line, looking for ways they can be more inclusive and better live up to the platform that they’ve designed for us,” Gabriel told a news agency.

“A woman’s ability to compete at Miss Universe, or anything in life, shouldn’t be defined by her age. Age should just be a number," she added.

Gabriel has been an advocate of age inclusivity for a while now. During the question and answer round in the 2023 edition of the pageant, she was asked what change she would like to see made in the competition rule. Gabriel had back then spoken about how she would like to see the age of eligibility increase.

“My favourite quote is ‘If not now, then when?’ Because I believe age should not define us,” Gabriel said at the time. “It’s not tomorrow, it’s not yesterday, but it’s now — the time is now that you can go after what you want.”

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