SEAToday.com, Jakarta - The Los Angeles 2028 Olympics (LA 2028) will feature 351 medal events—22 more than Paris 2024—with a total athlete quota of 10,500, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced on Wednesday, April 9. 

An additional 698 athlete spots have been allocated for five newly added sports: baseball/softball, cricket, flag football, lacrosse, and squash, all proposed by the LA 2028 organizing committee.

The IOC also declared that, for the first time in Olympic history, all team sports will feature a minimum equal number of women’s teams as men’s. Gender equality, the IOC emphasized, was a key consideration when determining athlete quotas and event numbers. The initial sports program includes 5,333 female athletes and 5,167 male athletes.

LA 2028 will also introduce mixed-gender categories in several sports, including archery, athletics (4x100m mixed relay), golf, gymnastics, rowing coastal beach sprint, and table tennis.

In swimming, 50-meter backstroke, butterfly, and breaststroke events will be held for both men and women. Rowing will debut solo women’s (CW1x), solo men’s (CM1x), and mixed double sculls (CX2x) in the coastal beach sprint category.

The 3x3 basketball tournament will expand from eight to 12 teams per gender. In sport climbing, bouldering and lead events will now be contested as separate categories.

Additionally, 24 of the 31 International Olympic Federations submitted requests to modify their event programs from Paris 2024. A total of 46 new events were proposed (16 men’s, 17 women’s, and 13 mixed), with six potentially replacing existing events, resulting in 40 net additional requests. These proposals included 772 additional athlete quotas (339 men and 433 women).

In March 2025, the IOC also approved the inclusion of boxing, bringing the total number of sports for LA 2028 to 31.

Writer: Andi Raisa Malaha Thambas