On the April 11 episode of SmackDown, Lana was solely drafted to the SmackDown brand as part of the Superstar Shake-up. As vignettes hyping her televised return aired, Lana resumed in-ring competition under her new gimmick at NXT live events that same month. Lana made her return on the June 6 episode of SmackDown, unsuccessfully vying to compete in the impending women's Money in the Bank ladder match, while also igniting a feud with SmackDown Women's Champion Naomi. On June 18, Lana was defeated by Naomi in her first televised singles match at Money in the Bank. She went on to compete against Naomi two more times on the June 27 and July 4 episodes of SmackDown Live, where she was defeated both times. On July 23 at Battleground, Lana competed in a five-way elimination match to determine the number one contender for the SmackDown Women's Championship, where she was eliminated by Becky Lynch. At the Royal Rumble, Lana participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match as the 13th entrant, but was eliminated by Michelle McCool. In the first round of the WWE Mixed Match Challenge, Lana and Rusev defeated Elias and Bayley, marking Lana's first official win in WWE.