Olympic medal table by population and wealth: Which countries fared the best at the Paris Games?

The United States and China dominated the medal table at the Paris Games, but other — smaller and poorer — countries also achieved spectacular success. Take for example the island of Saint Lucia, which is home to just 200,000 inhabitants; it won two medals thanks to sprinter Julien Alfred.

How can we fairly measure Olympic merit? There are many nuances, but the main issue is to take into account the advantage of two specific variables: being a country with a large population (because it helps you win the genetic lottery of sporting talent) and being a rich country (to develop that talent).

The first chart shows the winners in total medals and also in medals per capita.

The chart shows the total winners, with the U.S. (126 metals) and China (91) in the lead, followed by the United Kingdom (65), France (64), Australia (53) and Japan (45).

But the countries that are successful in terms of their population are more interesting: Dominica, Grenada and Saint Lucia have more than 10 medals per million inhabitants, between 20 and 40 times more than countries like Spain (0.4 per million) or the United States (0.4). Other top-performing countries are Jamaica (2.1), Australia (2), Hungary (2), the Netherlands (1.9) and New Zealand (3.9).

Looking at this list, it is easy to remember another variable that predicts sporting success: wealth. Countries with the highest gross domestic product (GDP) per capita win more medals per inhabitant, as shown in the following graph. But by crossing these two variables, we can see that there are a lot of exceptional countries that achieve results beyond what is expected from a nation of their size and economic level.

The highest performance is seen in the Caribbean islands: Dominica, Grenada, Saint Lucia and Jamaica have won more medals than one would expect from middle-income and tiny countries. It is a pattern that has been repeated for decades. For example, Jamaica has won 83 medals since 2004, which is far above the number won by other countries of similar size and income, such as Costa Rica (3 medals), Albania (2) or Lebanon (1).

Australia and New Zealand are still successful even after adjusting for GDP. Also striking is the number of medals won by some former Soviet republics, such as Kyrgyzstan (all in wrestling, boxing and judo), Georgia and Armenia. In Europe, the Netherlands also stands out, with almost two medals per million inhabitants.

One point to note with this second chart is that highly populated countries are at a disadvantage. They have a hard time winning lots of medals per capita, because they don’t send as many athletes in relation to their population size — otherwise one in three athletes at the Olympic Games would be Chinese or Indian. For example, Ireland sent 125 athletes to Paris and Spain 336, even though Spain’s population is almost 10 times larger. As for China, it took 423 athletes, just 20% more than Spain, even though its population is 30 times larger.

The advantage of being a host

It is a cliché that holds true: when a country hosts the Games, it usually improves its ranking in the medal tally. France has gone from winning 33 medals in Tokyo to 62 in Paris, confirming a rule that has few exceptions. Spain broke its record in Barcelona 1992, as did Australia in Sydney 2000, Greece in Athens 2004, China in Beijing 2008 and Japan in Tokyo 2020.

These charts highlight Spain’s poor performance at the Paris Games. It won 18 medals, 1.7% of the total, which is more than it achieved in Tokyo (17 and 1.6%), but is still far from the 22 medals won in 1992, which were 2.7% of the total. There was no karate in Paris, where Spain won a gold and a silver four years ago. But this year, there was another advantage: there were hardly any Russian competitors, which meant about 70 medals from 2020 were up for grabs. This likely explains what we see in the graph above: nearly every country won more medals than at the Tokyo Games.

Many studies have analyzed why hosting the Games helps countries win medals. They highlight factors such as the investment in sports and infrastructure prior to the competition, the benefit of competing at home, sending more athletes than usual and automatically qualifying in team sports.

Since the 2020 Tokyo Games, the International Olympic Committee has also invited host countries to propose new sports. The hope is that they will choose disciplines that are popular in their country, where they are more likely to win and attract an audience to the events. In Japan, skateboarding, karate, sport climbing and windsurfing were introduced. The result? Japan won five medals in skateboarding, three in karate, two in climbing and two in surfing. In 2024, the new sport was breakdancing, where France won one of the six medals up for grabs.

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