Witt won a fourth and final World title to end her amateur career at the 1988 World Championships in Budapest, Hungary. She turned in a relatively lackluster long program, popping out of both a planned triple loop and triple salchow, and below the quality of her Olympic performance, but with other top contenders also being mostly subpar and fatigued after the high of the Calgary Games, she won gold with a victory in compulsory figures (just second win in figures in a World or Olympic event, only other instance was 1984 Worlds), 2nd place to Debi Thomas in the short program, and victory in the long program. One of her rivals, silver medalist Elizabeth Manley, later complained about some of what she perceived to be dubious foul play in the event, including Witt's win in the figures where she overcame Manley's lead in the first two figures in the final loop figure, which Manley believed to be her best, and Manley's music not being played properly to start her short program (where Manley had a combination miss and took only 4th place, ending her gold medal chances).