How Many Athletes Compete in the Olympics?

Though the numbers change with each Olympics, over 10,000 athletes compete in the Summer Olympics and about 5,000 in the Winter Games. Part of that difference has to do with the number of participating nations — over 200 nations compete in the Summer Olympics compared to about 80 in the Winter. It also has to do with the number of events — the Summer Olympics consists of over 25 sports and more than 300 events, whereas the Winter Olympics has about 7 sports and about 100 events.

Other Olympic Numbers:

• About 4,000 athletes compete in the Summer Paralympics, and about 500 athletes compete in the Winter Paralympics.


• In total, there have been over 27,000 Olympic medalists.


• About 500 athletes have participated in 5 or more Olympic Games.