2018 Winter Olympics Facts for Kids

Pyeongchang

Location in South Korea

The 2018 Winter Olympics was a huge sports event. It was officially called the XXIII Olympic Winter Games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) organized it. The games took place from February 9 to 25, 2018, in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

This was the first time South Korea hosted the Winter Olympic Games. It was also the second time the country held an Olympics. The first was the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul.

These games had 102 events across fifteen different sports. This was the first time a Winter Olympics had more than 100 medal events! Four new types of events were added. These included big air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling, mass start speed skating, and mixed team alpine skiing.

A total of 2,952 athletes from 92 countries competed. Some countries, like Ecuador, Eritrea, Kosovo, Malaysia, Nigeria, and Singapore, sent athletes for the very first time.

Host City of the 2018 Winter Olympics
About the Games
Medal Winners
Images for kids
See also

Host City of the 2018 Winter Olympics

The city chosen to host the 2018 Winter Olympics was:

Pyeongchang, South Korea

About the Games

Opening Ceremony Fun

The exciting opening ceremony for the 2018 Winter Olympics happened at the Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium. This big event took place on February 9, 2018.

Sports at the Winter Olympics

Many different sports were part of the 2018 Winter Olympics. The number next to each sport shows how many medal events were held for it.

Athletes from Around the World

Many countries sent athletes to compete in Pyeongchang. Here is a list showing how many athletes came from each country:

IOC Code	Country	Athletes
USA	USA	242
CAN	CAN	226
SUI	SUI	169
OAR	Olympic Athletes from Russia	168
GER	GER	156
JPN	JPN	124
ITA	ITA	122
KOR	KOR	122
SWE	SWE	116
NOR	NOR	109
FRA	FRA	107
FIN	FIN	106
AUT	AUT	105
CZE	CZE	95
CHN	CHN	81
SLO	SLO	71
POL	POL	62
GBR	GBR	59
SVK	SVK	56
AUS	AUS	51
KAZ	KAZ	46
COR	Korea	35
LAT	LAT	34
NED	NED	33
BLR	BLR	33
UKR	UKR	33
ROU	ROU	27
EST	EST	22
BEL	BEL	22
BUL	BUL	21
NZL	NZL	21
CRO	CRO	19
HUN	HUN	19
DEN	DEN	17
ESP	ESP	13
ISR	ISR	10
PRK	PRK	10
BRA	BRA	9
LTU	LTU	9
TUR	TUR	8
CHI	CHI	7
ARG	ARG	7
AND	AND	5
ISL	ISL	5
IRL	IRL	5
BIH	BIH	4
COL	COL	4
GEO	GEO	4
GRE	GRE	4
IRI	IRI	4
MEX	MEX	4
SRB	SRB	4
TPE	TPE	4
THA	THA	4
ARM	ARM	3
JAM	JAM	3
LBN	LBN	3
LIE	LIE	3
MKD	MKD	3
MON	MON	3
MNE	MNE	3
NGR	NGR	3
ALB	ALB	2
BOL	BOL	2
IND	IND	2
KGZ	KGZ	2
MAS	MAS	2
MDA	MDA	2
MGL	MGL	2
MAR	MAR	2
PAK	PAK	2
PHI	PHI	2
POR	POR	2
UZB	UZB	2
AZE	AZE	1
BER	BER	1
CYP	CYP	1
ECU	ECU	1
ERI	ERI	1
GHA	GHA	1
HKG	HKG	1
KEN	KEN	1
KOS	KOS	1
LUX	LUX	1
MAD	MAD	1
MLT	MLT	1
PUR	PUR	1
SMR	SMR	1
SGP	SGP	1
RSA	RSA	1
TLS	TLS	1
TGA	TGA	1
TOG	TOG	1

Due to a past issue, Russian athletes competed as Olympic Athletes from Russia. They did not use their country's flag or anthem.

A special unified Korean team played in the women's ice hockey tournament. This team had players from both North Korea and South Korea. Out of 35 players, 12 were from North Korea and 23 were from South Korea.

Olympic Calendar

The games followed a schedule based on Korea Standard Time (UTC+9).

OC	Opening ceremony	●	Event competitions	1	Event finals	EG	Exhibition gala	CC	Closing ceremony

February	8th Thu	9th Fri	10th Sat	11th Sun	12th Mon	13th Tue	14th Wed	15th Thu	16th Fri	17th Sat	18th Sun	19th Mon	20th Tue	21st Wed	22nd Thu	23rd Fri	24th Sat	25th Sun	Events
Ceremonies		OC																CC	N/A
Alpine skiing				1	1	1	1	1		1	1			1	1	1	1		11
Biathlon			1	1	2		1	1		1	1		1		1	1			11
Bobsleigh											●	1	●	1			●	1	3
Cross country skiing			1	1		2		1	1	1	1			2			1	1	12
Curling	●	●	●	●	●	1	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	1	1	3
Figure skating		●		●	1		●	1	●	1		●	1	●		1		EG	5
Freestyle skiing		●		1	1			●	1	1	2	●	1	1	1	1			10
Ice hockey			●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	1	●	●	1	2
Luge			●	1	●	1	1	1											4
Nordic combined							1						1		1				3
Short track speed skating			1			1				2			1		3				8
Skeleton								●	1	1									2
Ski jumping	●		1		1				●	1		1							4
Snowboarding			●	1	1	1	1	1	1			●		●	●	1	3		10
Speed skating			1	1	1	1	1	1	1		1	1		2		1	2		14
Daily medal events			5	7	8	8	6	7	5	9	6	3	5	7	8	6	8	4	102
Cumulative total			5	12	20	28	34	41	46	55	61	64	69	76	84	90	98	102	102
February	8th Thu	9th Fri	10th Sat	11th Sun	12th Mon	13th Tue	14th Wed	15th Thu	16th Fri	17th Sat	18th Sun	19th Mon	20th Tue	21st Wed	22nd Thu	23rd Fri	24th Sat	25th Sun	Total events

Medal Winners

The medal table shows which countries won the most medals. It's ordered by the number of gold medals first. If there's a tie in gold medals, then silver medals are counted. If still tied, bronze medals are counted. If there's still a tie, the countries are listed in alphabetical order.

Host nation (South Korea)

Rank	NOC	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Norway (NOR)	14	14	11	39
2	Germany (GER)	14	10	7	31
3	Canada (CAN)	11	8	10	29
4	United States (USA)	9	8	6	23
5	Netherlands (NED)	8	6	6	20
6	Sweden (SWE)	7	6	1	14
7	South Korea (KOR)	5	8	4	17
8	Switzerland (SUI)	5	6	4	15
9	France (FRA)	5	4	6	15
10	Austria (AUT)	5	3	6	14
11	Japan (JPN)	4	5	4	13
12	Italy (ITA)	3	2	5	10
13	Olympic Athletes from Russia (OAR)	2	6	9	17
14	Czech Republic (CZE)	2	2	3	7
15	Belarus (BLR)	2	1	0	3
16	China (CHN)	1	6	2	9
17	Slovakia (SVK)	1	2	0	3
18	Finland (FIN)	1	1	4	6
19	Great Britain (GBR)	1	0	4	5
20	Poland (POL)	1	0	1	2
21	Hungary (HUN)	1	0	0	1
21	Ukraine (UKR)	1	0	0	1
23	Australia (AUS)	0	2	1	3
24	Slovenia (SLO)	0	1	1	2
25	Belgium (BEL)	0	1	0	1
26	Spain (ESP)	0	0	2	2
26	New Zealand (NZL)	0	0	2	2
28	Kazakhstan (KAZ)	0	0	1	1
	Latvia (LAT)	0	0	1	1
	Liechtenstein (LIE)	0	0	1	1
Total (30 NOCs)		103	102	102	307

Images for kids

Pyeongchang's award card, announced by the IOC's honorary president Jacques Rogge
Woljeongsa in Pyeongchang, Gangwon-do
Sangwonsa in Pyeongchang, Gangwon-do
2018 Olympics gold medal
2018 Winter Olympics torch
Dragon Valley (Alpensia) Ski Resort
Alpensia Resort and wind turbines in Pyeongchang
Parade of Nations at 2018 Olympic opening ceremony