Alternate versions

The British cinema release version was cut by the BBFC to shorten the beating scene after a few punches and to completely remove the second flashback sequence where Mortimer's sister shoots herself to avoid a possible rape. Although all UK video and original DVD releases contained these scenes, the 2005 Special Edition DVD was missing around 20 secs from the beating (which ends abruptly and without the dialogue exchange between Indio and Groggy).

The German theatrical version has been cut by 10 minutes from the original release. Even though the movie was partially re-dubbed in 1995, the cuts have been kept. The following material was removed:

• Pre-credits sequence shortened
• The intro text after the credits is removed (restored in the 1995 re-dub),
• The head shot closeup of Guy Calloway is removed.
• Indio shoots multiple times into the guard room.
• Wife and child of the traitor of Indio are shot by Indio's men; dueling scene between Indio and the traitor is shortened,
• Beating scene of Monco and Mortimer shortened,
• When Mortimer's Sister commits suicide, the pan down to the bleeding wound is removed,
• The scene in which Monco counts the bounty as wounded Groggy tries to shoot him and Monco kills him, thus "solving his arithmetics problem", is removed

In the United States, an edited 126 minute version was released. This version was used for television syndication, pay-TV, and initial home video releases.

The Swedish cinema version was shortened by 1m 2sec in the assault scene. The video version from Warner is probably the same censored version.

In 2003, the German TV network "Kabel 1" aired a restored and uncut version, identical with the one on US-DVD. All previously cut scenes have been dubbed and the movie was presented for the first time on German TV in its original 2.35:1 ratio.

All the wide-screen versions from MGM lack a scene at the end of the sequence when Manco and Col. Mortimer are beaten. Twenty seconds are missing, where Indio jumps from the wall and orders the beating stopped. He orders them tied up, and his aide asks why keep them alive. This cut is contained in all the DVD releases by MGM worldwide, including the newly restored Special Edition. The British Pan & Scan VHS video is uncut, as well as the Italian DVD release (which, however, only contains Italian language audio). The only uncut DVD version with English language track is the German DVD by Paramount.