The modern Olympic Games (Olympics; ) are the world's biggest international sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports events in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of athletic competitions. The Olympic Games, open to both amateur and professional athletes, involve more than 200 teams, each team representing a sovereign state or territory. The Games often, but not always, substitute for any world championships during the year in which they take place. The Olympics are staged every four years. Since 1994, they have alternated between the Summer and Winter Olympics every two years during the four-year Olympiad.
Their creation was inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, held in Olympia, Greece, from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. Baron Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1894, leading to the first modern Games in Athens in 1896. The IOC is the governing body of the Olympic Movement, which encompasses all entities and individuals involved in the Olympic Games. The Olympic Charter defines their structure and authority.
The evolution of the Olympic Movement during the 20th and 21st centuries has resulted in numerous changes to the Olympic Games. Some of these adjustments include the creation of the Winter Olympic Games for snow and ice sports, the Paralympic Games for athletes with disabilities, the Youth Olympic Games for athletes aged 14 to 18, the five Continental Games (Pan American, African, Asian, European, and Pacific), and the World Games for sports that are not contested in the Olympic Games. The IOC also endorses the Deaflympics and the Special Olympics. The IOC has adapted to a variety of economic, political, and technological advancements. The abuse of amateur rules prompted the IOC to shift away from pure amateurism, as envisioned by Coubertin, to the acceptance of professional athletes participating at the Games. The growing importance of mass media has created the issue of corporate sponsorship and general commercialisation of the Games. World Wars I and II led to the cancellation of the 1916, 1940, and 1944 Olympics; large-scale boycotts during the Cold War limited participation in the 1980 and 1984 Olympics; and the 2020 Olympics were postponed until 2021 because of the COVID-19 restrictions.
The Olympic Movement consists of international sports federations (IFs), National Olympic Committees (NOCs), and organising committees for each specific Olympic Games. As the decision-making body, the IOC is responsible for choosing the host city for each Games, and organises and funds the Games according to the Olympic Charter. The IOC also determines the Olympic programme, consisting of the sports to be contested at the Games. There are several Olympic rituals and symbols, such as the Olympic flag, the Olympic flame and torch relay, and the opening and closing ceremonies. Over 14,000 athletes competed at the 2020 Summer Olympics and 2022 Winter Olympics combined, in 40 different sports and 448 events. The first-, second-, and third-place finishers in each event receive Olympic medals: gold, silver, and bronze, respectively.
The Games have grown to the point that nearly every nation is now represented; colonies and overseas territories are often allowed to field their own teams. This growth has created numerous challenges and controversies, including boycotts, doping, match fixing, bribery, and terrorism. Every two years, the Olympics and its media exposure provide athletes with the chance to attain national and international fame. The Games also provide an opportunity for the host city and country to showcase themselves to the world.
The Olympic Games have become a significant global event, fostering international cooperation and cultural exchange. At the same time, hosting the Olympic Games can also bring significant economic benefits and challenges to the host city, affecting infrastructure, tourism and local communities.
Ancient Olympics
thumb|The [[Ancient Olympic Games stadium in Olympia, Greece]]
The "Ancient Olympic Games" (, ta Olympia) were religious and athletic festivals held every four years at the sanctuary of Zeus in Olympia, Greece. The date of the festival was determined according to a complicated formula whereby the midpoint of the festival would occur during the second full moon after the summer solstice—usually late August or early September. This "came after the annual harvest but before the picking of the olives." These Games featured mainly athletic but also combat sports such as wrestling and the pankration, horse and chariot racing events. It has been widely written that during the Games, all conflicts among the participating city-states were postponed until the Games were finished. This cessation of hostilities was known as the Olympic peace or truce. This idea is a modern myth because the Greeks never suspended their wars. The truce only allowed those religious pilgrims who were travelling to Olympia to pass through warring territories unmolested because they were protected by Zeus.
The origin of the Olympics is shrouded in mystery and legend; one of the most popular myths identifies Heracles and his father Zeus as the progenitors of the Games. According to legend, it was Heracles who first called the Games "Olympic" and established the custom of holding them every four years. and victory in that sprint was so valued that the next Olympiad was named after the winner, e.g. "the third year of the eighteenth Olympiad when Ladas of Argos won the stadion." Tradition has it that Coroebus, a cook from the city of Elis, was the first Olympic champion, which indicates that the competition was not limited to the aristocracy.
The Olympic Games reached the height of their success in the 6th and 5th centuries BC, but then gradually declined in importance as the Romans gained power and influence in Greece. While there is no scholarly consensus as to when the Games officially ended, the most commonly held date is 393 AD, when the emperor Theodosius I decreed that all pagan cults and practices be eliminated. Another date commonly cited is 426 AD, when his successor, Theodosius II, ordered the destruction of all Greek temples.
Modern Games
Forerunners
thumb|[[Pierre de Coubertin, co-founder of the International Olympic Committee and its second president]]
Various uses of the term "Olympic" to describe athletic events in the modern era have been documented since the 17th century. The first such event was the Cotswold Games or "Cotswold Olimpick Games", an annual meeting near Chipping Campden, England, involving various sports. It was first organised by the lawyer Robert Dover between 1612 and 1642, with several later celebrations leading up to the present day. The British Olympic Association, in its bid for the 2012 Olympic Games in London, mentioned these games as "the first stirrings of Britain's Olympic beginnings".
, a national Olympic festival held annually from 1796 to 1798 in Revolutionary France also attempted to emulate the ancient Olympic Games.
In 1850, an Olympian Class was started by William Penny Brookes at Much Wenlock, in Shropshire, England. In 1859, Brookes changed the name to the Wenlock Olympian Games. This annual sports festival continues to this day. The Wenlock Olympian Society was founded by Brookes on 15 November 1860.
Between 1862 and 1867, Liverpool held an annual Grand Olympic Festival. Devised by John Hulley and Charles Pierre Melly, these games were the first to be wholly amateur in nature and international in outlook, although only 'gentlemen amateurs' could compete. The programme of the first modern Olympiad in Athens in 1896 was almost identical to that of the Liverpool Olympics. In 1865 Hulley, Brookes and E. G. Ravenstein founded the National Olympian Association in Liverpool, a forerunner of the British Olympic Association. Its articles of foundation provided the framework for the International Olympic Charter.
Revival
thumb|[[Evangelos Zappas, co-founder of the International Olympic Committee]]
Greek interest in reviving the Olympic Games began with the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821. It was first proposed by poet and newspaper editor Panagiotis Soutsos in his poem "Dialogue of the Dead", published in 1833. Zappas and his cousin Konstantinos Zappas had left the Greek government a trust to fund future Olympic Games. This trust was used to help finance the 1896 Games. George Averoff contributed generously for the refurbishment of the stadium in preparation for the Games. This feeling was shared by many of the athletes, who even demanded that Athens be the permanent Olympic host city. The IOC intended for subsequent Games to be rotated to various host cities around the world. The second Olympics was held in Paris.
Changes and adaptations
thumb|[[Francis Olympic Field|Francis Field at Washington University in St. Louis during the 1904 Summer Olympics, the first held outside Europe|alt=]]
After the success of the 1896 Games, the Olympics entered a period of stagnation which threatened its survival. The Olympic Games held at the Paris Exposition in 1900 and the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis in 1904 failed to attract much participation or notice. The Games rebounded with the 1906 Intercalated Games (so-called because they were the second Olympics to take place within the third Olympiad), which were held in Athens. These Games attracted a broad international field of participants and generated a great deal of public interest, marking the beginning of a rise in both the popularity and the size of the Olympics. The 1906 Games were officially recognised by the IOC at the time (although not any longer), and no Intercalated Games have been held since.
Winter Games
thumb|An [[ice hockey game during the 1928 Winter Olympics at St. Moritz]]
The Winter Olympics was created to feature snow and ice sports that were logistically impossible to hold during the Summer Games. Figure skating (in 1908 and 1920) and ice hockey (in 1920) were featured as Olympic events at the Summer Olympics. The IOC desired to expand this list of sports to encompass other winter activities. At the 1921 Olympic Congress in Lausanne, it was decided to hold a winter version of the Olympic Games. A winter sports week (it was actually 11 days) was held in 1924 in Chamonix, France, in connection with the Paris Games held three months later; this event became the first Winter Olympic Games. This tradition was upheld until the 1992 Games in Albertville, France; after that, beginning with the 1994 Games, the Winter Olympics were held every four years, two years after each Summer Olympics.
Paralympics
thumb|[[1964 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo]]
In 1948, Sir Ludwig Guttmann, determined to promote the rehabilitation of soldiers after World War II, organised a multi-sport event between several hospitals to coincide with the 1948 London Olympics. Originally known as the Stoke Mandeville Games, Guttmann's event became an annual sports festival. Over the next 12 years, Guttmann and others continued their efforts to use sports as an avenue to healing.
In 1960, Guttmann brought 400 athletes to Rome to compete in the "Parallel Olympics", which ran in parallel with the Summer Olympics and came to be known as the first Paralympics. Since then, the Paralympics have been held in every Olympic year and, starting with the 1988 Summer Games in Seoul, the host city for the Olympics has also played host to the Paralympics.<!-- The following note is not strictly necessary given that the 1988 Winter Olympics were before the 1988 Summer Olympics, but that fact is not obvious so a clarification is useful.--> The International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) signed an agreement in 2001 which guaranteed that host cities would be contracted to manage both the Olympic and Paralympic Games. The agreement came into effect at the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, and at the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
Two years before the 2012 Games, the LOCOG chairman Lord Coe made the following statement about the Paralympics and Olympics in London:
Youth Games
In 2010, the Olympic Games were complemented by the Youth Games, which give athletes between the ages of 14 and 18 the chance to compete. The Youth Olympic Games were conceived by IOC president Jacques Rogge in 2001 and approved during the 119th Congress of the IOC. The first Summer Youth Games were held in Singapore from 14 to 26 August 2010, while the inaugural Winter Games were hosted in Innsbruck, Austria, two years later. These Games will be shorter than the senior Games; the summer version will last twelve days, while the winter version will last nine days.
21st-century Games
Over 14,000 athletes competed at the 2020 Summer Olympics and 2022 Winter Olympics combined, in 40 different sports and 448 events. The Summer Olympics have grown from 241 participants representing 14 nations in 1896, to more than 11,300 competitors representing 206 nations in 2020. The scope and scale of the Winter Olympics is smaller; for example, Beijing hosted 2,971 athletes from 91 nations in 2022. Most of the athletes and officials are housed in the Olympic Village for the duration of the Games. This accommodation centre is designed to be a self-contained home for all Olympic participants, and is furnished with cafeterias, health clinics, and locations for religious expression.
The IOC has allowed the formation of National Olympic Committees (NOCs) to represent individual nations. These do not meet the strict requirements for political sovereignty that other international organisations demand. As a result, colonies and dependencies are permitted to compete at Olympic Games, examples being territories such as Puerto Rico, Bermuda, and Hong Kong, all of which compete as separate nations despite being legally a part of another country. The current version of the Olympic Charter allows for the establishment of new NOCs to represent nations that qualify as "an independent State recognised by the international community". Consequently, the IOC did not allow the formation of NOCs for Sint Maarten and Curaçao when they gained the same constitutional status as Aruba in 2010, although the IOC had recognised the Aruban Olympic Committee in 1986. Since 2012, athletes from the former Netherlands Antilles have had the option to represent either the Netherlands or Aruba.
Cost of the Games
The Oxford Olympics Study 2016 found that, since 1960, sports-related costs for the Summer Games were on average US$5.2 billion and for the Winter Games $3.1 billion. These figures do not include wider infrastructure costs like roads, urban rail, and airports, which often cost as much or more than the sports-related costs. The most expensive Summer Games were Beijing 2008 at US$4044 billion, and the most expensive Winter Games were Sochi 2014 at US$51 billion. As of 2016, costs per athlete were, on average, US$599,000 for the Summer Games and $1.3 million for the Winter Games; for London 2012, the cost per athlete was $1.4 million, and the figure was $7.9 million for Sochi 2014.
Budget overruns are common for the Games. Average overrun for Games since 1960 is 156% in real terms, which means that actual costs turned out to be on average 2.56 times the budget that was estimated at the time of winning the bid to host the Games. Montreal 1976 had the highest cost overrun for Summer Games, and for any Games, at 720%; Lake Placid 1980 had the highest cost overrun for Winter Games, at 324%. London 2012 had a cost overrun of 76%, Sochi 2014 of 289%.
The final cost for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics was reported to be JPY 1,423.8 billion (US$13 billion). This was achieved by balancing revenues and expenditures through various efforts to increase revenue and continuously review expenditures. The primary sources of revenue included the International Olympic Committee (IOC) contribution of JPY 86.8 billion (US$0.8 billion), TOP sponsorship of JPY 56.9 billion (US$0.5 billion), local sponsorship of JPY 376.1 billion (US$3.4 billion), an insurance payout of JPY 50 billion (US$0.5 billion) for the postponement of the Games, and other sources including licensing. The expenditures included JPY 195.5 billion (US$1.8 billion) for venue-related costs and JPY 444.9 billion (US$4 billion) for service expenditures. The total cost also accounted for COVID-19 countermeasures amounting to JPY 35.3 billion (US$0.3 billion). Despite initial estimates, the total costs were reduced by JPY 220.2 billion (US$2 billion) from the budget announced in December 2020, and JPY 29.2 billion (US$0.3 billion) from the estimated budget in December 2021. This successful financial management resulted in a balanced budget for the Tokyo 2020 Games.
Economic and social impact on host cities and countries
Seeking a scholarly institution to independently research the Games, Bob Barney led efforts to establish the International Centre for Olympic Studies in 1989, endeavouring to write about sociocultural impacts of the Olympic Games. He felt that the Olympics "is worthy of study because it is one of the biggest meetings in a global context and has many political, economic, and other problems associated with it". Founded in 1991, the International Society of Olympic Historians publishes the Journal of Olympic History.
Some economists are sceptical about the economic benefits of hosting the Olympic Games, emphasising that such "mega-events" often have large costs while yielding relatively few tangible benefits in the long run. Hosting (or even bidding for) the Olympics appears to increase the host country's exports, as the host or candidate country sends a signal about trade openness when bidding to host the Games. Research suggests that hosting the Summer Olympics has a positive effect on the philanthropic contributions of corporations headquartered in the host city, which seems to benefit the local nonprofit sector. This effect begins in the years leading up to the Games and might persist for several years afterwards, though it is not permanent.
The Games have had significant negative effects on host communities; for example, the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions reports that the Olympics displaced more than two million people over two decades, often disproportionately affecting disadvantaged groups. The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi were the most expensive Olympic Games in history, costing in excess of US$50 billion. According to a report by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development released at the time of the Games, the cost would not boost Russia's national economy but could attract business to Sochi and the southern Krasnodar region of Russia as a result of improved services. By December 2014, eight months after the Games, The Guardian stated that Sochi "now feels like a ghost town", citing the spread-out nature of the stadiums and arenas and the still-unfinished infrastructure. At least four cities withdrew their bids for the 2022 Winter Olympics, citing the high costs or lack of local support, resulting in only a two-city race between Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Beijing, China (which hosted the 2008 Summer Olympics). The Guardian stated that the biggest threat to the future of the Olympics is that few cities or countries want to host them. Bidding for the 2024 Summer Olympics became a two-city race between Paris and Los Angeles, so the IOC took the unusual step of simultaneously awarding both the 2024 Games to Paris and the 2028 Games to Los Angeles. Both of the bids were praised for their high-tech plans and innovative ways of using a record-breaking number of existing and temporary facilities.
International Olympic Committee
The Olympic Movement encompasses a large number of national and international sporting organisations and federations, recognised media partners, as well as athletes, officials, judges, and every other person and institution that agrees to abide by the rules of the Olympic Charter.
- National Olympic Committees (NOCs) represent and regulate the Olympic Movement within each country. For example, the Hellenic Olympic Committee (HOC) is the NOC of Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic. There are currently 206 NOCs recognised by the IOC.
- Organising Committees for the Olympic Games (OCOGs) are temporary committees responsible for the organisation of each Olympic Games. OCOGs are dissolved after each Games once the final report is delivered to the IOC.
French and English are the official languages of the Olympic Movement. The other language used at each Olympic Games is the language of the host country (or languages, if a country has more than one official language apart from French or English). Every proclamation (such as the announcement of each country during the parade of nations in the opening ceremony) is spoken in these three (or more) languages, or the main two depending on whether the host country is an English or French speaking country. These languages were spoken in the traditional order: French is always spoken first, followed by English, and then the dominant language of the host nation (when this is not English or French).
In March 2025, Kirsty Coventry made history by becoming the first woman and the first African to be elected as President of the IOC. Coventry embodies high aspirations, envisioning a future where the Olympics serve as a symbol of global unity, weaving together diverse cultures and nations through athletic excellence. Coventry's leadership is set to ensure that every nation has an equal chance to shine on the Olympic stage, separating sports from politics. Coventry's plans align with the IOC's broader efforts to strengthen global partnerships, particularly with BRICS nations, while reinforcing its role as a global unifier, promoting peace and development through sports.
Allegations of bribery and corruption
The IOC has often been accused of being an intractable organisation, with several life members on the committee. The presidential terms of Avery Brundage and Juan Antonio Samaranch were especially controversial. Brundage fought strongly for amateurism and against the commercialisation of the Olympic Games, even as these attitudes came to be seen as incongruous with the realities of modern sports. The advent of state-sponsored athletes from the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it placed self-financed amateurs of Western countries at a disadvantage. Brundage was accused of antisemitism and of racism in resisting the exclusion of South Africa. Samaranch's ties with the Franco regime in Spain were also a source of criticism.
In 1998, it was reported that several IOC members had taken gifts from members of the Salt Lake City bid committee for the hosting of the 2002 Winter Olympics. There were soon four independent investigations underway: by the IOC, the United States Olympic Committee (USOC), the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC), and the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). Although nothing strictly illegal had occurred, it was felt that the acceptance of the gifts was morally dubious. As a result of the investigation, ten members of the IOC were expelled and a further ten sanctioned. Stricter rules were adopted for future bids, and caps were introduced to define how much IOC members could accept from bid cities. Additionally, new term and age limits were put into place for IOC membership, and fifteen former Olympic athletes were added to the committee. Nevertheless, from sporting and business standpoints, the 2002 Olympics were one of the most successful Winter Games in history; records were set in both the broadcasting and marketing programs. Over two billion viewers watched more than 13 billion viewer-hours. The 2002 Games were also a financial success, raising more money with fewer sponsors than any prior Olympic Games, leaving SLOC with a surplus of $40 million. This excess revenue was used to create the Utah Athletic Foundation (also known as the Utah Olympic Legacy Foundation), which maintains and operates many of the surviving Olympic venues.
In July 2000, when the Los Angeles Times reported on the tangled nature of how the IOC redistributes profits from sponsorships and broadcasting rights, Olympic historian Bob Barney stated that he had "yet to see matters of corruption in the IOC" but noted that there were "matters of unaccountability". He later noted that when the spotlight is on the athletes, it has "the power to eclipse impressions of scandal or corruption", with respect to the Olympic bid process.
In August 2004, a BBC documentary, Panorama: Buying the Games, reported the results of an investigation into bribes allegedly used in the bidding process for the 2012 Summer Olympics. Parisian mayor Bertrand Delanoë specifically accused the British prime minister Tony Blair and the London bid committee, headed by former Olympic champion Sebastian Coe, of breaking the bid rules. He cited French president Jacques Chirac as a witness; Chirac gave guarded interviews concerning his involvement but the allegation was never fully explored. Turin's bid to host the 2006 Winter Olympics was also clouded by controversy; a prominent IOC member, Marc Hodler, closely connected to the rival bid of Sion, Switzerland, alleged bribery of IOC officials by members of the Turin Organising Committee. These accusations led to a wide-ranging investigation, and also served to sour many IOC members against Sion's bid which potentially helped Turin to capture the host city nomination.
Commercialisation
Under national organising committees
The Olympic Games have been commercialised to various degrees since the inaugural 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens, when a number of companies paid for advertising, including Kodak. In 1908, Oxo, mouthwash, and Indian Foot Powder became official sponsors of the London Olympic Games. Coca-Cola first sponsored the Summer Olympics in 1928, and has remained an Olympic sponsor ever since.
Under IOC control
The IOC originally resisted funding by corporate sponsors. It was not until the retirement of IOC President Avery Brundage, in 1972, that the IOC began to explore the potential of the television medium and the lucrative advertising markets available to them.
Effect of television
thumb|upright=1.25|A [[Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung cartoon published during the 1936 Olympics in Berlin envisions the Olympics in 2000, when spectators would be replaced by television and radio, with the cheers of spectators broadcast through loudspeakers. Almost a century after the prediction, spectators still watch the Games in person and by globally-broadcast television coverage.]]
The 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin were the first Games to be broadcast on television, though only to local audiences. The 1956 Winter Olympics in Italy were the first internationally televised Olympic Games, and the broadcasting rights for the following Winter Games in California were sold for the first time to specialised television broadcasting networks—CBS paid US$394,000 for the American rights. NBC then agreed to a $7.75 billion contract extension on 7 May 2014, to air the Olympics up to and including the 2032 Games. NBC also acquired the American television rights to the Youth Olympic Games, beginning in 2014, and the Paralympic Games. More than half of the Olympic Committee's global sponsors are American companies, and NBC is one of the major sources of revenue for the IOC.
Viewership increased exponentially from the 1960s until the end of the 20th century. This was due to the advent of satellites for broadcasting live television worldwide starting in 1964, and the introduction of colour television in 1968. The global audience for the 1968 Mexico City Games was estimated to be 600 million, whereas the audience numbers at the Los Angeles Games of 1984 had increased to 900 million; this number had swelled to 3.5 billion by the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona. Notable examples of maximising U.S. television viewership include scheduling the finals of the swimming events only during the mornings of the host cities Beijing (during the 2008 Summer Olympics) and Tokyo (during the 2020 Summer Olympics), which coincide with the evening prime time broadcast slots of the United States.
Olympic marketing
The funds from licensing programs support everything that goes into the Games, alongside other revenue streams from ticket sales and broadcasting rights, which represent more than 60 percent.
The sale of the Olympic brand has been controversial. The argument is that the Games have become indistinguishable from any other commercialised sporting spectacle.
Symbols
thumb|The [[Olympic flag]]
The Olympic Movement uses symbols to represent the ideals embodied in the Olympic Charter. The main emblem of the Games is the Olympic rings—five intertwined rings symbolising the unity of the five inhabited continents (Africa, the Americas (considered as one continent), Asia, Europe, and Oceania). The coloured version of the rings—blue, yellow, black, green, and red—over a white field forms the Olympic flag. These colours were chosen because every nation had at least one of them on its national flag. The flag was adopted in 1914 but flown for the first time only at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium. It has since been hoisted during each celebration of the Games. The IOC maintains exclusive ownership and control of the use of Olympic symbols through the Nairobi Treaty on the Protection of the Olympic Symbol.
The Olympic motto, , a Latin expression meaning "Faster, Higher, Stronger" was proposed by Pierre de Coubertin in 1894 and has been official since 1924. The motto was coined by Coubertin's friend, the Dominican priest Henri Didon OP, for a Paris youth gathering of 1891.
Coubertin's Olympic ideals are expressed in the Olympic creed: