The World Aquatics Championships (known as the FINA World Championships until 2022) are the World Championships for six aquatic disciplines: swimming, diving, high diving, open water swimming, artistic swimming, and water polo. The championships are staged by World Aquatics, formerly known as FINA (Fédération internationale de natation), the international federation recognised by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for administering international competitions in water sports. The championships are World Aquatics' largest event traditionally held biennially every odd year, with all six of the aquatic disciplines contested every championships. A 50m length pool is used for swimming races.

The championships were first staged in 1973 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, with competitions held in swimming, diving, synchronised swimming and water polo.^[1] In 1991 open water swimming was added to the championships as a fifth discipline.^[2] In 2013 high diving was added to the championships as a sixth discipline.^[3] In 2017 the synchronised swimming discipline was renamed to artistic swimming.^[4]

Prior to the 9th World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka in 2001, the championships had been staged at various intervals of two to four years. From 2001 to 2019 the championships were held biennially in odd years. Due to interruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic, travel restrictions, host venues withdrawing from hosting championships and World Aquatics' withdrawing the rights to host championships, the championships will be staged in every year from 2022 to 2025 until resuming to biennial from 2025 onwards.

The World Open Water Swimming Championships (also known as 'Open Water Worlds') is part of the World Aquatics Championships. Additional standalone editions of the Open Water Championships were also held in the even years from 2000 to 2010. The World Masters Championships (also known as 'Masters Worlds) is open to athletes 25 years and above (30+ years in water polo) in each aquatics discipline excluding high diving and has been held as part of the World Aquatics Championships since 2015. Prior to this, the Masters Championship was held separately, biennially in even years.

Athletes from all current 208 World Aquatics member federations are eligible to compete at the championships, along with athletes considered 'Neutral Independent Athletes' under the rules of World Aquatics and athletes from the 'World Aquatics Refugee Team'. The 2019 championships set the record for the most athletes participating (2,623).^[5] At the recent 2023 championships participated athletes from record 195 nations: 192 member federations, 2 suspended member federations and Athlete Refugee Team.

Championships

Member federations referred to as winners, second, and third, in the table below, are the top three nation's listed on the medal tally based on the standard method of ranking (being total gold medals, followed by total silver medals, and then total bronze medals).

Year	Dates	Edition	Location	Athletes	Events	Events Details	Winner	Second	Third	Most Medals
1973	31 August – 9 September	1	Belgrade, Yugoslavia	686	37	18 (M), 19 (W)	United States	East Germany	Italy	United States
1975	19–27 July	2	Cali, Colombia	682	37	18 (M), 19 (W)	United States	East Germany	Hungary	United States
1978	20–28 August	3	West Berlin, West Germany	828	37	18 (M), 19 (W)	United States*	Soviet Union	Canada	United States
1982	29 July – 8 August	4	Guayaquil, Ecuador	848	37	18 (M), 19 (W)	United States	East Germany	Soviet Union	United States
1986	13–23 August	5	Madrid, Spain	1119	41	19 (M), 22 (W)	East Germany	United States	Canada	United States
1991	3–13 January	6	Perth, Australia	1142	45	21 (M), 24 (W)	United States	China	Hungary	United States
1994	1–11 September	7	Rome, Italy	1400	45	21 (M), 24 (W)	China	United States	Russia	China
1998	8–17 January	8	Perth, Australia	1371	53	24 (M), 27 (W), 2 (X)	United States	Russia	Australia	United States
2001	16–29 July	9	Fukuoka, Japan	1498	61	29 (M), 32 (W)	Australia	China	United States	United States
2003	12–27 July	10	Barcelona, Spain	2015	62	29 (M), 33 (W)	United States	Russia	Australia	United States
2005	16–31 July	11	Montreal, Canada	1784	62	29 (M), 33 (W)	United States	Australia	China	United States
2007	18 March – 1 April	12	Melbourne, Australia	2158	65	29 (M), 36 (W)	United States	Russia	Australia	United States
2009	17 July – 2 August	13	Rome, Italy	2556	65	29 (M), 36 (W)	United States	China	Russia	United States and  China
2011	16–31 July	14	Shanghai, China	2220	66	29 (M), 36 (W), 1 (X)	United States	China	Russia	China
2013	19 July – 4 August	15	Barcelona, Spain	2293	68	30 (M), 37 (W), 1 (X)	United States	China	Russia	United States
2015	24 July – 9 August	16	Kazan, Russia	2400	75	30 (M), 37 (W), 8 (X)	China	United States	Russia	China
2017	14–30 July	17	Budapest, Hungary	2360	75	30 (M), 37 (W), 8 (X)	United States	China	Russia	United States
2019	12–28 July	18	Gwangju, South Korea	2623	76	30 (M), 38 (W), 8 (X)	China	United States	Russia	United States
2022	18 June – 3 July	19	Budapest, Hungary	2034	74	29 (M), 37 (W), 8 (X)	United States	China	Italy	United States**
2023	14–30 July	20	Fukuoka, Japan	2392	75	31 (M), 33 (W), 11 (X)	China	Australia	United States	United States
2024	2–18 February[6]	21	Doha, Qatar
2025		22	Kallang, Singapore[7]
2027		23	Budapest, Hungary[7]

* Record by number of gold medals –  United States (23 gold medals, 1978)
** Record by number of total medals –  United States (49 medals in total, 2022)

All-time medal table

Updated after the 2023 World Aquatics Championships.

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	United States	293	240	182	715
2	China	184	116	94	394
3	Australia	110	115	85	310
4	Russia	105	73	62	240
5	East Germany	51	44	27	122
6	Italy	48	52	69	169
7	Hungary	42	33	31	106
8	Germany	41	62	70	173
9	France	32	33	33	98
10	Great Britain	32	32	56	120
11	Canada	28	53	65	146
12	Netherlands	19	38	34	91
13	Sweden	19	20	17	56
14	Japan	18	48	77	143
15	Brazil	17	15	18	50
16	Soviet Union	16	28	28	72
17	Spain	13	37	31	81
18	South Africa	13	7	16	36
19	Ukraine	12	18	28	58
20	West Germany	8	7	12	27
21	Poland	6	11	9	26
22	Romania	5	2	7	14
23	Denmark	4	8	8	20
24	Greece	4	6	8	18
25	Zimbabwe	4	5	0	9
26	Tunisia	4	3	4	11
27	Lithuania	4	2	3	9
28	Serbia	4	2	1	7
29	Finland	3	2	2	7
30	Croatia	2	3	4	9
31	Belarus	2	1	3	6
	South Korea	2	1	3	6
	Yugoslavia	2	1	3	6
34	Mexico	1	13	15	29
35	Austria	1	5	5	11
36	Switzerland	1	5	2	8
37	Norway	1	2	1	4
38	Malaysia	1	1	6	8
39	Bulgaria	1	1	4	6
40	Belgium	1	1	2	4
	Costa Rica	1	1	2	4
	North Korea	1	1	2	4
	Yugoslavia /  Serbia and Montenegro	1	1	2	4
44	Colombia	1	1	0	2
45	Suriname	1	0	0	1
46	New Zealand	0	5	7	12
47	Slovakia	0	3	2	5
48	Czech Republic	0	3	0	3
49	Cuba	0	1	1	2
	Czechoslovakia	0	1	1	2
	Iceland	0	1	1	2
	Jamaica	0	1	1	2
53	Ecuador	0	1	0	1
	Hong Kong	0	1	0	1
	Montenegro	0	1	0	1
	Portugal	0	1	0	1
57	Egypt	0	0	3	3
58	Argentina	0	0	2	2
	Singapore	0	0	2	2
60	Kazakhstan	0	0	1	1
	Puerto Rico	0	0	1	1
	Trinidad and Tobago	0	0	1	1
	Venezuela	0	0	1	1
Totals (63 entries)		1159	1169	1155	3483

Multiple gold medalists

Boldface denotes active athletes and highest medal count per type.

Rank	Athlete	Country	Gender	Discipline	From	To	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Michael Phelps	United States	M	Swimming	2001	2011	26	6	1	33
2	Katie Ledecky	United States	F	Swimming	2013	2023	21	5	–	26
3	Svetlana Romashina	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2005	2019	21	–	–	21
4	Natalia Ishchenko	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2005	2015	19	2	–	21
5	Ryan Lochte	United States	M	Swimming	2005	2015	18	5	4	27
6	Svetlana Kolesnichenko	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2011	2019	16	–	–	16
7	Caeleb Dressel	United States	M	Swimming	2017	2022	15	2	–	17
8	Alla Shishkina	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2009	2019	14	–	–	14
9	Anastasia Davydova	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2001	2011	13	1	–	14
10	Alexandra Patskevich	Russia	F	Artistic swimming	2009	2017	13	–	–	13

Disciplines, events & medalists

Except where specified below, there are male and female categories for each event.

See also

• World Aquatics
• FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m)
• FINA World Junior Swimming Championships
• FINA Swimming World Cup
• FINA World Masters Championships
• FINA Marathon Swim World Series
• List of World Aquatics Championships medalists in swimming (men)
• List of World Aquatics Championships medalists in swimming (women)
• Major achievements in swimming by nation

Notes and references

External links

Media related to World Aquatics Championships at Wikimedia Commons