Most Decorated Olympians of All Time and Their Medal Count

Swimming, gymnastics, and track and field are some disciplines where elite Olympians have won most medals – including individual and team competitions. The 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games will be the second or third Olympic Games for many decorated athletes, who intend to add to their medal hauls. Despite having collected five medals each at the 2016 Rio Games, swimmer Katie Ledecky and gymnast Simone Biles still have a long way to go before they join the elite group of athletes who have won the most Olympic medals. Here is a list of the Most Decorated Olympians in Olympic history based on the number of medals they have won.

Most Decorated Olympians of All Time

Michael Phelps holds the record for the most gold medals in Olympic history. In the period from 2004 to 2016, the swimming superstar won 28 medals, which is ten more than the previous record of 18. As a result of Phelps’ feat during the Olympics in London, he surpassed Larisa Latynina’s record of 18 medals. During the 2016 Rio Olympics, he added six more to ensure that his record would be virtually unbreakable.

The list of the most decorated Olympians also includes other gymnasts.

• Nikolai Andrianov (Soviet Union, 15 medals); 
• Boris Shakhlin (Soviet Union, 13 medals); 
• Ono Takashi (Japan, 13); Kato Sawao (Japan, 12); and 
• Aleksei Nemov (Russia, 12). 

Italian fencer Edoardo Mangiarotti also won 13 Olympic medals from five different Olympics between 1936 and 1960. 

List of Multiple Olympic Medallists – Summer Olympics

Athlete	Sport	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
Michael Phelps	Swimming	23	3	2	28
Larisa Latynina	Gymnastics	9	5	4	18
Nikolai Andrianov	Gymnastics	7	5	3	15
Boris Shakhlin	Gymnastics	7	4	2	13
Edoardo Mangiarotti	Fencing	6	5	2	13
Takashi Ono	Gymnastics	5	4	4	13
Paavo Nurmi	Athletics	9	3	0	12
Birgit Fischer	Canoeing	8	4	0	12
Sawao Katō	Gymnastics	8	3	1	12
Jenny Thompson	Swimming	8	3	1	12
Ryan Lochte	Swimming	6	3	3	12
Dara Torres	Swimming	4	4	4	12
Alexei Nemov	Gymnastics	4	2	6	12
Natalie Coughlin	Swimming	3	4	5	12
Mark Spitz	Swimming	9	1	1	11
Matt Biondi	Swimming	8	2	1	11
Věra Čáslavská	Gymnastics	7	4	0	11
Viktor Chukarin	Gymnastics	7	3	1	11
Carl Osburn	Shooting	5	4	2	11
Carl Lewis	Athletics	9	1	0	10
Aladár Gerevich	Fencing	7	1	2	10

List of Multiple Olympic Medallists – Winter Olympics

Athlete	Sport	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
Marit Bjørgen	Cross-country skiing	8	4	3	15
Ole Einar Bjørndalen	Biathlon	8	4	1	13
Bjørn Dæhlie	Cross-country skiing	8	4	0	12
Ireen Wüst	Speed skating	5	5	1	11
Raisa Smetanina	Cross-country skiing	4	5	1	10
Stefania Belmondo	Cross-country skiing	2	3	5	10
Lyubov Yegorova	Cross-country skiing	6	3	0	9
Claudia Pechstein	Speed skating	5	2	2	9
Sixten Jernberg	Cross-country skiing	4	3	2	9
Sven Kramer	Speed skating	4	2	3	9
Charlotte Kalla	Cross-country skiing	3	6	0	9
Uschi Disl	Biathlon	2	4	3	9
Ahn Hyun-Soo Viktor Ahn	Short track speed skating	6	0	2	8
Ricco Groß	Biathlon	4	3	1	8
Emil Hegle Svendsen	Biathlon	4	3	1	8

Most Olympic Medals At A Single Olympic Games

Phelps shares this record with gymnast Aleksandr Dityatin, unlike the overall medal record. A total of eight medals won by Michael Phelps in 2004 and 2008 matched the record set by Dityatin in 1980 in Moscow.

A total of ten athletes have won seven medals at one Olympic Games, tying them for second place. 

• Two of them did so in the pool: Spitz in 1972 and Biondi in 1988. 
• Two Americans, Willis Lee and Lloyd Spooner, each brought home seven medals in shooting in 1920. 

Rounding out the list are five gymnasts: 

• Shakhlin (Soviet Union, 1960); 
• Andrianov (Soviet Union, 1976); 
• Hermann Weingaertner (Germany, 1896); 
• Maria Gorokhovskaya (Soviet Union, 1952); and 
• Mikhail Voronin (Soviet Union, 1968).

Twenty-five athletes have won six medals in a single Olympics.

That’all we have in this updated list of most decorated Olympians in the modern history of the games. Hope this list help you in answering Olympic related questions in upcoming government exams.

Most Decorated Olympians – FAQs