While the United States offers less than $40,000 to athletes who make it onto the podium at the Summer Olympics, one Asian delegation is set to offer nearly $800,000 for Olympic glory.
by Justin Birnbaumwith Forbes staff Sofia ChierchioContributor
circleWhen LeBron James and the U.S. men's basketball team take the court Sunday, they'll be competing for more than just national pride. Every U.S. athlete who wins a gold medal this summer will receive a $37,500 bonus from the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee. That's not a huge difference for a millionaire (or, in James' case, billionaire) NBA star, but it's a boon for many other athletes trying to finance their Olympic dreams.
Still, the financial reward pales in comparison to what other countries are offering if they win gold medals, ahead of the Paris Olympics, which officially kick off with an opening ceremony on Friday. Forbes After contacting the National Olympic Committees and government sports ministries of all 206 participating countries and territories, at least 33 countries have confirmed they will offer cash prizes for medals, with 15 of those confirming they will pay more than $100,000 to the athlete who tops the podium.
Hong Kong, which competes independently of China in the Olympics, ranked first among respondents. Hong Kong pays $768,000 for a gold medal, but in Hong Kong's 17 appearances in the Summer Olympics, Hong Kong athletes have only won gold twice. In fact, Hong Kong's silver medal prize is higher than the prize money paid by 32 other countries for winning, at a staggering $380,000. By comparison, second-place Israel and third-place Serbia award $275,000 and $218,000, respectively, to their athletes who make it to the top of the podium. All three of these delegations have produced athletes who have won gold medals at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
Cash bonuses for medal wins are often just one example of how countries reward their elite athletes. The USOPC pays $22,500 for a silver medal and $15,000 for a bronze medal, as well as grants and benefits (such as health insurance) widely offered to Olympic athletes. Malaysia and Bulgaria give gold medalists lifetime allowances of more than $1,000, and Chile, Kosovo, and Lithuania have similar allowances, but they end at the next Olympics. New Zealand structures its payments as an annual bonus, with gold medalists receiving $40,000 each year until the next Olympics. Denmark gives only $15,000 for a gold medal, but this is tax-free prize money, a perk in a country with one of the highest tax rates in the world.
Thomas Deschamps
Poland, meanwhile, is offering a host of other perks beyond the roughly $82,000 awarded to its gold medalists. In Paris, all medalists will receive a painting by a “talented and respected” Polish artist, investment-grade diamonds, and vacation vouchers for two from a travel agent. (Their coaches will also receive similar perks.) Plus, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Poland's Olympic participation, individual gold medalists will receive a two-bedroom apartment in the Warsaw metropolitan area, and first-place team winners will receive a one-bedroom apartment.
Many countries, including Norway, Iceland and Sweden, don't offer explicit financial compensation for winning a medal, but sometimes offer athletes other types of subsidies. “We want to make sure our athletes have all the support they need before the Olympics to give them the best possible chance of success at the Olympics,” said Ã…sa Edlund Jonsson, secretary general of the Swedish Olympic Committee. Forbes The same is true in the UK, but British Athletics, the governing body for the country's athletics teams, pays medal bonuses independently of the government.
Here are 15 countries and territories offering six-figure prize money to individual gold medallists.
ðŸ‡ðŸ‡° Hong Kong: $768,000
Hong Kong won six medals, including a gold in men's foil fencing, at the last Summer Olympics held in Tokyo in 2021. But even if a Hong Kong athlete doesn't make the podium in Paris, Hong Kong still has hefty prize money up its sleeve: about $100,000 for fourth place and $50,000 for fifth to eighth place.
🇮🇱 Israel: $275,000
Israel offers about $192,000 for a silver medal and $137,000 for a bronze medal, meaning that just making it onto the podium can earn you six-figure prize money, except in team sports. For athletes competing in pairs, Israel pays each member 75% of the bonus; members of teams of three or four get 50% and groups of five or more get 40% each. In “ball games” like soccer, a gold medal would earn about $275,000 for a team of 18 athletes and seven staff members. All prize money is tax-free.
🇷🇸 Serbia: $218,000
The Serbian government offers cash bonuses to medallists, but that's not the only benefit of reaching the podium: Players who win gold, silver or bronze medals are eligible for a state pension, paid monthly and payable from age 40. That's good news for Novak Djokovic, 37, who is hoping to add an Olympic medal in men's tennis to his already-overflowing trophy case, his 2008 bronze medal.
🇲🇾 Malaysia: $214,000
Prize money for medal winners from Malaysia varies widely: more than $200,000 for a gold medal and 10 percent of that amount for a bronze medal. Regardless of podium finish, Malaysian athletes are entitled to a life pension, ranging from roughly $400 to $1,100 a month.
🇮🇹 Italy: $196,000
Italy does not split the medal prize money for team sports, with each athlete receiving about $196,000 for a gold medal, $98,000 for a silver medal, and $65,000 for a bronze medal — the same amount as individual athletes. If Italy performs as well as it did in the last Summer Olympics, the prize money could be huge. At the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, Italy won 13 team medals.
🇱🇹 Lithuania: $182,000
The Lithuanian government pays medal salaries to both athletes and coaches, based on a monthly “basic social benefit” that is used to calculate social security. The Olympics also offer other perks: Lithuania pays its medalists' rent after their athletic careers end, for example.
🇲🇩 Moldova: $171,000
For Moldovan athletes, even an eighth-place finish would get a bonus, roughly $11,000 from the government, but a podium finish would mean at least 10 times that amount. Moldova won just one medal at the last Olympics, a bronze in men's canoeing.
🇱🇻 Latvia: $155,000
Latvia is generous in doling out bonuses to its athletes in the first six places: a gold medal pays about $155,000, while each subsequent place is paid 60% of the previous place, so a silver medal pays about $93,000 and a bronze medal about $56,000. The same rules apply to team bonuses, but for a gold medal, Latvia pays a lump sum of about $470,000 to all athletes, coaches and support staff participating in the competition.
ðŸ‡ðŸ‡º Hungary: $154,000
In addition to the hefty gold medal bonus, Hungary also has a relatively large bronze medal prize of about $88,000, which is good news for the Hungarian water polo team, which won bronze medals in both the men's and women's events at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
🇧🇬 Bulgaria: $139,000
Bulgaria's medal bonus system gives individual athletes a slight advantage, paying $139,000 for a gold medal, plus approximately $111,000 for a silver medal and $83,000 for a bronze medal. In teams with two or more athletes, 70% of the athletes receive 90% of the individual bonus, and the remaining 30% receive 50% of the above amounts.
🇺🇦 Ukraine: $125,000
At the last Summer Olympics, Ukraine had 29 athletes reach the podium in individual and team events, winning 20 medals, but only one was a gold medal, in men's Greco-Roman wrestling.
🇽🇰 Kosovo: $120,000
Kosovo athletes receive bonuses from both the country's sports ministry and the national Olympic committee if they win a gold medal. They can earn even more if they perform record-breaking in the Summer Olympics. Kosovo's sports ministry awards about $218,000 to athletes who set records in individual events and about half that amount for team records.
🇪🇪 Estonia: $109,000
Olympic success has a sticking point for Estonian athletes, as finishing in the top 10 at an Olympic Games earns them increased benefits from the country's Olympic program. For example, a gold medal brings a cash bonus of about $109,000, and a championship win brings about $7,000 a month for the next two years. Coaches are also eligible for bonuses, but are capped at half the athlete's bonus.
🇨🇿 Czech Republic: $103,000
Traditionally a powerhouse in women's tennis, the Czech Republic will be without a Tokyo Olympic silver medalist after Marketa Vondroušová withdrew from the tournament ahead of Paris, but the country still has a chance of winning gold with 2024 Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova, one half of the defending Wimbledon doubles champion.
🇪🇸 Spain: $102,000
An Olympic gold medal can earn Spanish athletes six figures in individual events, but not in team events. The top prize for a member of a two-person team is about $82,000, and for groups of three or more, it's about $54,000 per person. At the last Olympics, Spain had six teams win medals, including a gold in the mixed trap shooting event.
methodology
Medal bonuses will be converted from local currency at the exchange rate on July 22nd and quoted in US dollars rounded up to the nearest thousand dollars.
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