Each country that has been represented at the Olympic Games has its own three-letter abbreviation or code. This code is used during the Olympic Games to represent that country. Some countries have had other codes for previous Olympic Games. It was only in 1976 that the IOC started to assign standardized codes for each country. Prior to then, the local Organizing Committees of each Olympic Games choose codes, often in the local language, thereby resulting in a multitude of codes being used.
The list below contains the all the current "countries" that are recognized by the International Olympic Committee as National Olympic Committees, and their current 3-digit code, as well as some of the codes used in the past.
An asterisk (*) indicates a territory rather than an independent country. The link for each country goes to a page with more information about the history of that country's participation at the Olympic Games
Related Pages
- Countries at the Olympics
- Number of countries participating at the Olympics for each Olympiad.