Your Guide to the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics: When and How to Watch—and What to Expect

The Summer Olympics are returning to Paris after 100 years. The last time the French capital hosted the international competition was in 1924, when there were 22 sports. This time, there will be 32, including one that’s making its Olympics debut.

Also, for the first time in Summer Games’ history, the Olympics Opening Ceremony won’t be held in a stadium. Instead, organizers are planning to parade a flotilla of boats down the Seine that runs through the heart of the city.

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Here’s everything you need to know to be ready for the Paris 2024 Summer Olympic Games.

When is the Paris 2024 Olympics?  

The Opening Ceremony of what is officially the XXXIII Olympiad is scheduled to begin at 7:30 a.m. ET on July 26—though soccer and rugby sevens events kick off on July 24. The closing ceremony takes place on Aug. 11.

What are the sporting events?

This summer, 10,500 athletes from over 200 national committees as well as a refugee team will comPete in 329 events.

The Paris Olympics will include 28 returning Sports, following the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics (which took place in 2021 due to COVID-19), as well as four special additions: sport climbing, skateboarding, surfing, and breaking—the last of which is making its Olympics debut. The International Olympic Committee accepted Paris 2024 organizers’ proposal to include these additional Sports because they “contribute to making the programme of the Olympic Games more gender balanced, more youthful and more urban.”

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Below are the comPetition dates for each sport. For a detailed schedule, click here.

Where are the various games being held?

Most—but not all—of the Summer Games will be played within or in the outskirts of the city of Paris. Ten of the 35 official venues are outside the host metro area, including in the French cities of Nice, Marseille, and Bordeaux. Meanwhile, the surfing competition will take place 10,000 miles away on the waves off of the French Polynesian island of Tahiti.

Paris 2024 organizers have emphasized their commitment to sustainability by using mostly pre-existing venues, such as the Stade de France—which is the home stadium of the French national soccer team and will be the site of the closing ceremony as well as several athletic events—in addition to eco-friendly temporary structures, including the Athletes’ Village, which was built on a former industrial wasteland site. Only one permanent competition venue—the Aquatics Centre in Saint-Denis—was built specifically for the 2024 Summer Games.

Paris 2024 organizers announced ambitious—and controversial—plans to hold the marathon swimming events and swimming legs of the Olympics and Paralympics triathlons in the Seine, which has been closed to swimming for over a century due to persistent pollution. But even after an extensive and expensive cleanup effort, officials have acknowledged that swimming events planned for the river may have to be postponed or canceled if the water remains too dirty.

Read More: Inside the Billion-Dollar Effort to Clean Up the World’s Most Romantic River

Are tickets still available?

Millions of spectators are expected to watch the Summer Games in-person, according to Paris 2024 organizers, and while some sessions are sold out—early birds have already purchased their tickets after registering as far back as December 2022—tickets to a number of events remain available, including some for as low as €15 (about $16).

How can I watch the Olympics on TV?

NBCUniversal is the official U.S. broadcaster of the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, and while Paris is six hours ahead of Eastern time, every day NBC will air at least nine hours of daytime coverage in addition to a three-hour primetime show recapping the biggest moments. Meanwhile, streaming platform Peacock will feature—for the first time in Summer Games history—every sport and event live as well as full replays. NBCU’s Telemundo will provide Spanish-language coverage of the Games.

BBC is the official U.K. broadcaster, while other Olympics broadcasters can be found here.

What countries are expected to do best?

Team USA is expected to bring home the most medals, which would be the eighth successive Summer Games that they top the leaderboard. According to a May forecast by data analytics company Gracenote, Team USA is projected to win 39 gold medals, 36 silver, and 50 bronze, for a total of 125, besting the 113 medals the team earned during the Tokyo 2020 Games.

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China is forecast to follow suit, taking home a projected 90 medals. And Great Britain is expected to come in third place with a projected 62 medals. Host country France is projected to win 55 medals—almost double what it won in Tokyo.

When and where are the next Olympics?

The Summer Paralympics follows shortly after the Summer Games, starting on Aug. 28 and ending on Sept. 8.

The Winter Olympics are set for February 2026 in the Italian cities of Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. And the next Summer Games will take place in Los Angeles in 2028.