25 Olympic and Paralympic sports events to watch in 2025

25 Olympic and Paralympic sports events to watch in 2025 with an emphasis on winter sports leading up to the 2026 Milan Cortina Games …

Prevagen U.S. Figure Skating Championships
Jan. 23-26, Wichita, Kansas
Ilia Malinin, Amber Glenn, the pairs’ team of Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea and ice dancers Madison Chock and Evan Bates are the defending champions. After the event, the team for March’s World Championships will be named: three men, three women, two pairs’ teams and three ice dance couples.

World Para Alpine Skiing Championships
Feb. 4-11, Maribor, Slovenia
The U.S. national team features 2022 Paralympic standing giant slalom silver medalist Thomas Walsh and seven-time Paralympic medalist Laurie Stephens. Stephens was the last American to win a global title in Para Alpine skiing at the 2021 Worlds.

World Alpine Skiing Championships
Feb. 4-16, Saalbach, Austria
Lindsey Vonn could compete at worlds for the first since 2019. Vonn, 40, unretired last month and placed 14th in her first World Cup race back on Dec. 21, a result that puts her in contention to make the world team. Mikaela Shiffrin, who owns the modern record of 14 career world medals, is currently sidelined after a Nov. 30 giant slalom crash.

World Luge Championships
Feb. 6-8, Whistler, Canada
Germany swept the four luge golds at the 2022 Olympics, but last year Austria won more titles in Olympic program events at the World Championships. The top American lugers are Chevonne Forgan and Sophia Kirkby, who race together in women’s doubles, which makes its Olympic debut in 2026.

4 Nations Face-Off
Feb. 12-20, Boston and Montreal
The U.S., Canada, Finland and Sweden gather for the first best-on-best international men’s hockey tournament in nine years. It will be held one year before NHL players are expected to return to the Olympics for the first time since 2014. The winner could very well be the 2026 Olympic favorite.

4 Nations Face-Off rosters: USA, Canada, Sweden, Finland hockey teams for 2025 event

Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid will suit up for Canada, one year before NHL players are expected to return to the Olympics.

World Biathlon Championships
Feb. 12-23, Lenzerheide, Switzerland
Norwegian Johannes Thingnes Bø is one of the most dominant athletes across winter sports. He won three of the four individual events at worlds in 2023 and 2024. He is tied with retired countryman Ole Einar Bjørndalen for the most world titles in biathlon history (20). If he repeats his haul of seven total medals from 2023 and 2024, he will tie Bjørndalen’s record 45 career medals.

U.S. Olympic Mixed Doubles Curling Trials
Feb. 17-23, Lafayette, Colorado
The first U.S. Olympic Trials event in any sport for the 2026 Milan Cortina Games. Mixed doubles made its Olympic debut in 2018. A U.S. pair has yet to make the playoffs at the Olympics, but Cory Thiesse and Korey Dropkin became the first Americans to win a world title in the event in 2023.

World Nordic Skiing Championships
Feb. 25-March 9, Trondheim, Norway
The biennial world championships for cross-country skiing, ski jumping and Nordic combined. At the last worlds in 2023, Jessie Diggins became the first American to win an individual world title in cross-country skiing. For the first time at worlds, there will be a women’s 50km mass start event to match the men’s distance. It will also be the first Nordic worlds to hold Para cross-country skiing events with sprints in sitting, standing and vision impaired classifications.

Goals? Jessie Diggins has 4 pages of them for 2024-25 cross-country skiing season

Jessie Diggins begins another cross-country skiing season with a “holy grail” race among her focuses.

World Ski Mountaineering Championships
March 3-8, Morgins, Switzerland
Ski mountaineering, also known as skimo, makes its Olympic debut in 2026 after appearing at the Youth Winter Olympics in 2020 and 2024. Athletes race up and down a course, spending part of it on skis and part of it on foot going up steps (with their skis attached to their back). It is dominated by European nations.

World Bobsled and Skeleton Championships
March 6-16, Lake Placid, New York
Last winter, Germany won 11 of the 12 bobsled medals at worlds, the most dominant performance by one nation in the competition’s history. This year, the U.S. hopes to get a boost on a home track. Kaillie Humphries, the 2022 Olympic monobob gold medalist, returned this season after having son Aulden on June 14. Elana Meyers Taylor, a five-time Olympic medalist, returned last season after having her second son. She was the lone non-German medalist at last winter’s worlds.

World Speed Skating Championships
March 13-16, Hamar, Norway
American Jordan Stolz eyes a triple-triple: winning the 500m, 1000m and 1500m at worlds for a third consecutive year. When he did it in 2023, he became the first man to win three individual golds at a single worlds.

World Short Track Speed Skating Championships
March 14-16, Beijing
Kristen Santos-Griswold goes into 2025 ranked No. 1 in the world. Last March, she won the 1000m at worlds, becoming the first American to claim a world short track title since 2011. She won five total medals in five events, becoming the first American to win a medal in all three individual Olympic distances — 500m, 1000m and 1500m — at one worlds since short track became an Olympic medal sport in 1992.

World Freestyle Skiing and Snowboarding Championships
March 18-30, St. Moritz, Switzerland
The busiest world championships in all of winter sports, including nearly one-quarter of the events on the 2026 Olympic program. Notables include Canadian Mikaël Kingsbury, a record eight-time world champion (four each in moguls and dual moguls). American Lindsey Jacobellis followed her 2022 Olympic snowboard cross golds (individual and team) with individual bronze at the 2023 Worlds, becoming at 37 the oldest snowboard cross world championships medalist.

World Figure Skating Championships
March 26-29, Boston
The U.S. hosts worlds for the first time since 2016 (when Boston was also host). Malinin and Chock and Bates could each defend their titles. Glenn, the world’s top women’s singles skater this fall, could bid to become the first U.S. woman to win a world title since 2006 (Kimmie Meissner). Worlds will also determine how many 2026 Olympic spots the world’s top nations will receive in each discipline.

Amber Glenn’s figure skating story ties to Jason Brown, Ashley Wagner, 7th grade math class

Amber Glenn reflected on long-ago memories of Jason Brown and Ashley Wagner, plus recent ones with a local school class.

World Women’s Hockey Championship
April 9-20, Ceske Budejovice, Czechia
Expect the U.S. and Canada to reach the gold-medal game for the 23rd time in 24 editions of worlds. The reigning world champion won the last two Olympic titles in 2018 (U.S.) and 2022 (Canada). Last year, Canada beat the U.S. 6-5 on a golden goal.

World Para Hockey Championship
May 24-31, Buffalo
The U.S. hosts worlds for the first time since 2015 (also Buffalo). In 2024, Canada clipped the U.S. 2-1 to deny the Americans a fourth consecutive world title. The U.S. and Canada met in the last seven world championship gold-medal games, plus the last two Paralympic finals (both won by the Americans).

USA Swimming Championships
June 3-7, Indianapolis
The field could include reigning individual Olympic gold medalists Katie Ledecky, Kate Douglass, Torri Huske and Bobby Finke. The top two in most events qualify for this summer’s World Championships.

World Aquatics Championships
July 11-Aug. 3, Singapore
The biennial worlds for swimming, open-water swimming, artistic swimming, diving, high diving (not on the Olympic program) and water polo. Expect a duel in the pool between the U.S. and Australia swimmers. Ledecky needs two medals to pass Ryan Lochte for second in world championships history behind Michael Phelps.

Gretchen Walsh finishes short course swim worlds with 11 world records, 7 gold medals

Gretchen Walsh broke more world records than Michael Phelps did at the 2008 Olympics.

USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships
July 31-Aug. 3, Eugene, Oregon
Expect most of the Paris Olympians to compete with spots on the World Championships team at stake. Some already have byes onto the world team as reigning world champions, including Noah Lyles (100m, 200m), Grant Holloway (110m hurdles), Ryan Crouser (shot put), Sha’Carri Richardson (100m) and Katie Moon (pole vault).

U.S. Gymnastics Championships
Aug. 7-10, New Orleans
It’s unclear how many 2024 Olympic team members will return in 2025. Simone Biles took the year off after each of the last two Olympics. Suni Lee also didn’t compete on the elite stage in the year after winning the Tokyo Olympic all-around title.

World Track and Field Championships
Sept. 13-21, Tokyo
USA Track and Field bagged 34 medals and 14 gold medals at the Olympics, its most in each category since the 1984 LA Games. It also won the most gold medals and most total medals at the last four worlds. Lyles and Richardson can become the second man and second woman to win back-to-back world 100m titles since 2000 after Usain Bolt and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce. Holloway can become the first hurdler to win the same event four consecutive times.

Sifan Hassan, Letsile Tebogo win World Athletics Athlete of the Year awards

Sifan Hassan and Letsile Tebogo were named the top track and field athletes of 2024.

World Para Swimming Championships
Sept. 21-27, Singapore
The U.S. is coming off 30 swimming medals, including 10 golds, at the Paris Paralympics. Jessica Long, one of three American Para swimmers to win two individual golds in Paris, is a 37-time world champion to go along with her 18 Paralympic golds.

World Para Track and Field Championships
Sept. 26-Oct. 5, New Delhi
The first time India hosts a senior World Track and Field Championships. The U.S. was second behind China in the Paris Paralympic track and field medal standings with 38 medals, including 10 golds. Jaydin Blackwell swept the T38 100m and 400m at worlds in 2023 and 2024, plus at the Paris Games. Roderick Townsend-Roberts won all eight Paralympic and world titles in the T47 high jump dating to 2015.

World Gymnastics Championships
Oct. 19-25, Jakarta, Indonesia
Worlds in the year after the Olympics are traditionally for individual events only. It’s very possible that it will yield a new women’s all-around champion. Biles and Lee could each take 2025 off. Brazilian Rebeca Andrade has talked about stepping away from all-around competition to focus on specific apparatuses.

U.S. Olympic Curling Trials
Nov. 11-16, Sioux Falls, South Dakota
The trials will determine the men’s team and women’s team for the 2026 Milan Cortina Games, should the U.S. qualify quota spots through international competition. For the men, 2018 Olympic champion John Shuster is expected to bid for a sixth Winter Olympic team. If successful, he would tie the U.S. record held by Nordic combined skier Todd Lodwick.

2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics daily competition schedule

The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics take place Feb. 4-22, 2026.