Los Angeles 2028 set to feature more women than men as new Olympic events revealed
For the first time ever, there will be more Olympic quota spots allocated to women than men.
That was announced on Wednesday after the IOC Executive Board approved the competition program for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games.
The overall quota of 10,500 athletes in the core Olympic sports remains unchanged from Paris 2024, but it now breaks down to 5333 female athletes and 5167 male athletes.
Los Angeles 2028 Official Olympic Competition Program
An additional 698 quota spots have been allocated to the sports proposed for inclusion by the LA28 Organizing Committee (baseball/softball, cricket, flag football, lacrosse, and squash). That includes 322 spots for women and 376 spots for men.
All combined, there are quota spots for 11,198 athletes to compete at Los Angeles 2028—5655 women and 5543 men.
The competition program will feature 351 medal events, which is 22 more than were held at Paris 2024. Six mixed gender events have been added, making the overall breakdown 161 women’s events, 165 men’s events, and 25 mixed events.
Gender parity had been achieved in the allocation of quota spots for Paris 2024, where a perfect 50-50 split of men and women was intended. But a further step is being taken towards gender balance in team sports at Los Angeles 2028.
Soccer will see a reversal in the number of teams per gender in the Olympic tournaments. Los Angeles 2028 will have 16 women’s teams compared to 12 men’s teams, reflecting the growth of women’s soccer around the world. Since Beijing 2008, there have consistently been 16 men’s teams and 12 women’s teams.
In water polo, two more women’s teams will qualify, bringing that number up to 12 to match the number of men’s teams.
Boxing is also achieving gender balance in the number of events by adding one more women’s weight class, giving men and women seven events each.
Read on for the details of major changes to events and quotas in other sports.
3×3 Basketball
After debuting at Paris 2024 with eight teams per gender, that number increases to 12 teams in each 3×3 basketball event.
Archery
For the first time ever, compound archery will be at the Olympic Games in the form of a mixed team compound event. It joins the five recurve events currently on the program.
Athletics
A mixed 4x100m relay has been added, becoming the second mixed gender event in the sport, joining the 4x400m relay. To make room for that, the marathon mixed race walking relay that debuted at Paris 2024 has been dropped. The lone race walk event for each gender is now a half marathon distance.
Golf
There will be a mixed team event in addition to the individual stroke play events for men and women.
Artistic Gymnastics
For the first time, men and women will compete together in the mixed team event.
Rowing
There will be a new discipline as three coastal beach sprint events have been added: women’s solo, men’s solo, and mixed double sculls. To make room for those, the men’s and women’s lightweight double sculls have been removed from the program.
Sport Climbing
In a further evolution, medals will be awarded in each of the three disciplines of speed climbing, bouldering, and lead climbing. When the sport made its Olympic debut at Tokyo 2020, all three were included in one combined event. At Paris 2024, speed climbing became a separate event while boulder and lead remained combined.
Swimming
Every stroke will now have 50m events for each gender. The 50m backstroke, 50m butterfly, and 50m breaststroke join the 50m freestyle, which has been part of the Olympic program since Seoul 1988.
Table Tennis
A mixed team event has been added.
For the team sports added at the request of LA28, there will be spots for six teams in each tournament: men’s and women’s cricket, men’s and women’s flag football, men’s baseball, women’s softball, men’s and women’s lacrosse. Squash will feature 16 men and 16 women competing in singles tournaments.
