Brazil at the Olympics

Brazil at the
Olympics
Flag of Brazil
IOC codeBRA
NOCBrazilian Olympic Committee
Websitewww.cob.org.br (in Portuguese)
Medals
Ranked 34th
Gold
40
Silver
49
Bronze
81
Total
170
Summer appearances
Winter appearances

Brazil first participated at the Olympic Games in 1920, after missing the previous five Summer editions.[1] The country has sent athletes to compete in every Summer Olympic Games since then, except for the 1928 Games. As of 2024, Brazilian athletes have won a total of 170 medals in 18 different Summer sports.

Brazil has also participated in the Winter Olympic Games since 1992. Due to Brazil being mostly a tropical nation, to this date no Brazilian athlete has won an Olympic medal in the winter sports and the country's best result at the Winter Olympics was a ninth place by snowboarder Isabel Clark Ribeiro at the 2006 Winter Olympics.

Volleyball (indoors and beach volley), sailing and judo are Brazil's top medal-producing sports in the Summer editions. The country is also the most decorated in football, with the men's team having seven medals (2 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze) and the women's team adding three silver medals for a total of ten.

Rio de Janeiro in Brazil was the host city to the 2016 Summer Olympics. This marked the first time that any country in South America has hosted the games.[2] This also marks the first time that a lusophone country hosted any edition of the Olympic Games. Rio was only the second city in Latin America to host the Summer Olympics, after Mexico City in 1968, and Brazil was only the second country of the southern hemisphere to host the Olympics, after Australia in 1956 and 2000.

As the hosts of the 2016 Summer Olympics, Brazil had the second most successful participation at the Summer Olympics to date, earning seven gold medals and nineteen medals overall. The nation's most successful overall performance at the Olympics occurred at the 2020 Summer Olympics. Tied with 2016 games in number of gold medals (7) and silver medals (6) but with 2 more bronze medals (8), Brazil became the second nation to surpass its medal total at the Olympics immediately following one that it hosted (the other one was Great Britain in the 2016 Olympics). The country broke the record for medals in one edition (21) and was also in the highest position on medal table on games history (12th place).

One athlete from Brazil has been awarded the Pierre de Coubertin medal: Vanderlei de Lima, a long-distance runner who was attacked by a spectator during the men's marathon at the 2004 edition in Athens, Greece, when he was leading the race. Lima lost two places, winning the bronze medal. In spite of the situation, he still celebrated the third-place, showing good sportsmanship.[3]

The National Olympic Committee for Brazil is the Brazilian Olympic Committee. The entity was created in 1914 and recognized in 1935.

Hosted Games

[edit]

Brazil has hosted the Games on one occasion.

Games Host city Dates Nations Participants Events
2016 Summer Olympics Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro 5 – 21 August 207 11,303 306

Unsuccessful Bids

[edit]
Games City Winner of bid
1936 Summer Olympics Rio de Janeiro Berlin, Germany
2000 Summer Olympics Brasília[a] Sydney, Australia
2004 Summer Olympics Rio de Janeiro Athens, Greece
2012 Summer Olympics Rio de Janeiro London, United Kingdom

Medals

[edit]
See also: All-time Olympic Games medal table
Medals won by Brazil between 1920 and 2020.

Medals by Summer Sport

[edit]
  Leading in that sport
Sports  Gold  Silver  Bronze Total Rank
 Sailing 8 3 8 19 11
 Judo 5 4 19 28 8
 Athletics 5 4 12 21 34
 Volleyball 5 4 3 12 2
 Beach volleyball 4 7 3 14 2
 Artistic gymnastics 3 5 2 10 20
 Football 2 6 2 10 4
 Swimming 2 4 11 17 24
 Boxing 2 2 5 9 28
 Canoeing 1 3 1 5 30
 Shooting 1 2 1 4 38
 Surfing 1 1 1 3 2
 Equestrian 1 0 2 3 20
 Skateboarding 0 3 2 5 3
 Basketball 0 1 4 5 10
 Taekwondo 0 0 3 3 36
 Modern pentathlon 0 0 1 1 25
 Tennis 0 0 1 1 33
Total (18) 40 49 81 170 32

Medals by Gender

[edit]
Gender  Gold  Silver  Bronze Total
Men 26 34 57 117
Women 13 15 21 49
Mixed / Open [b] 1 0 3 4
Total 40 49 81 170

Flagbearers

[edit]
See also: List of flag bearers for Brazil at the Olympics

Olympic medalists

[edit]
See also: List of Olympic medalists for Brazil