Social status plays a key role in expressing different emotions. However, little is known about which mechanisms underlie the variability of emotional responses that are linked to social hierarchy. Status instability-a natural characteristic of hierarchies-can help to untangle the status-emotion relationship. Therefore, we verified whether the emotional expressions of fighters could be predicted by the degree of asymmetry in their fighting abilities during a contest. Emotional expressions upon the announcement of victory or defeat were evaluated using three different methods: nonverbal behavior patterns, software-coded facial expressions, and raters' evaluation of athletes' emotional intensity (N = 824). Competition symmetry predicted contestants' emotional responses, especially happiness in victory and anger in defeat. Conversely, more asymmetric contests predicted expressions of sadness and shame upon defeat. The asymmetry in fighting abilities had no effect on athletes' expressions of pride. Our data confirmed that status instability may be crucial to explain the variety of emotional expressions in competitive contexts. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).