Another Olympics has come and gone so it is once again time to take a look at who “won” the 2026 Winter Olympics medal count by several different metrics. Per my previous posts, I continue to use a weighted scoring system to tally Olympic medals by country. This year I once again tracked not just the medal counts but also economic and demographic metrics for each country – you can see my full spreadsheet here.
348 medals were given at the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics – 21 more than were given four years ago (327 in 2022) and 41 more than eight years ago (307 in 2018). The Games continue their strong growth trend (291 in 2014 and 217 in 2010), representing more than 60% growth over a decade and a half. If you’re holding gold, you’re in good company: there are more of you every four years!
Norway has now repeated as the clear victor for the fourth consecutive Winter Olympics, taking home 18 golds and 41 total medals – both new all-time records for a single Winter Games. Their total weighted score of 137 left second-place USA far behind at 105, which itself was a significant step up from prior years thanks to an historic men’s ice hockey gold (the first since 1980!) and a dominant overall performance. The host nation Italy made its own strong showing, finishing third in weighted score – a welcome storyline for the home crowd. The top performers by weighted medal score were:
- 137 – Norway
- 105 – USA
- 82 – Italy
- 78 – Germany
- 74 – Netherlands
- 73 – France
Because Norway is so small, it crushed the competition even (especially!) when normalized by population. The top performers by weighted medal score per million citizens were:
- 24.82 – Norway
- 7.25 – Switzerland
- 6.60 – Slovenia
- 5.92 – Austria
- 5.85 – Sweden
These countries are mostly pretty affluent, though, so how do things change if we normalize instead by GDP? Not much! The top performers by weighted medal score per $B GDP (PPP) were:
- 0.228 – Norway
- 0.114 – Slovenia
- 0.079 – Sweden
- 0.079 – Austria
- 0.074 – Switzerland
We can mix up the leaderboard a little bit if we normalize by GDP per capita. The top performers by weighted medal score per $1,000 GDP per capita were:
- 1.48 – China
- 1.30 – Italy
- 1.26 – Norway
- 1.17 – USA
- 1.10 – France
A few storylines worth calling out: Italy’s home-field advantage appears to have been real – the Azzurri claimed 10 golds and 30 total medals, landing #2 on the GDP-per-capita efficiency list and delivering their best Winter Games performance in decades. Meanwhile, Brazil made history by winning the first Winter Olympics medal and gold medal ever by a tropical, Latin American, or South American nation. And Georgia won its first-ever Winter Olympics medal as well – a reminder that the Winter Olympics continue to expand their global footprint.
Russia continues to be absent from these rankings, and for good reason – the IOC’s ongoing restrictions on Russian athletes remain appropriate given their well-documented history of systematic doping.
Many congratulations to Norway, a small country of just 5.5 million people that continues to absolutely crush much larger and richer countries at these Games. Four consecutive titles is an astonishing dynasty. We’ll hope to give them more competition in four years in the French Alps at the 2030 Winter Olympics!