The opening ceremony for the 2026 Winter Olympics will be held on Friday, February 6 in Italy.
The 2026 Winter Olympic Games are set to begin on Friday, February 6 with the opening ceremony being held in the slopes of Italy. The games will primarily be held in the cities of Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo.
The opening ceremony will be held at San Siro Stadium in Milan.
Events including hockey, figure skating, skiing, snowboarding, and curling will be among the popular competitions during this year’s games. The games will feature 116 medal events across 16 disciplines.
New events including Women’s Large Hill Individual and Mixed Team Relay Skeleton will be held. A new sport, Ski Mountaineering, will make its Olympic debut at this year’s games. Ski Mountaineering combines uphill ski climbing and downhill racing.
For the hockey competition, Team Canada is the early favorite for the men’s competition with Team USA as the second favorite.
Norway is expected to win the most gold medals this year, with Team USA falling into second place for gold medal predictions.
The U.S. figure skating team is comprised of 16 members that include world champions in three events. Three-time world champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates will compete in the ice dance category, two-time world champion Ilia Malinin will compete in men’s singles, and Alysa Liu will compete in women’s singles after becoming the first American women’s singles skater to take a world title in 19 years.
Malinin will be one of the strongest gold-medal favorites of the Olympic Games. The 21-year-old has had two undefeated seasons and finished 30 points ahead of the competition in December’s Grand Prix Final.
The men’s team for the first Olympics with active NHL players since 2014 includes two returning competitors from 2022, defensemen Brock Faber and Jake Sanderson.
For ski mountaineering’s Olympic debut this year, Anna Gibson and Cam Smith will compete for Team USA. They won a World Cup mixed relay together in December in Salt Lake City that earned them the female and male spots at the Games.
Chloe Kim, a two-time Olympic snowboard halfpipe gold medalist, will be competing in the event for Team USA this year. She automatically earned her spot due to her No. 1 world ranking in the sport. She will be competing to become the first person to win three consecutive Olympic snowboard halfpipe gold medals.
For the first time since 2022, the men’s halfpipe team will not include Shaun White. He retired after his fifth Olympic Games in 2022.
Red Gerard, who earned a gold medal in the 2018 Olympic snowboard slopestyle, took an Olympic spot through his world ranking as the highest-ranked American man in slopestyle who is also ranked top three in the world.
For men’s freestyle skiing, athlete Alex Hall is favored to take home the gold. He won his first Olympic gold medal in 2022, and Milan Cortina will be his third time competing in the Winter Games.
