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Even predicting whether the Tokyo Olympics were going to go ahead was not easy, so predicting performances are even more difficult with the disruptions that have occurred to the athletes' training, competition and qualifying events in the lead up.

We have found several predictions online of the expected medal tally for the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Games, though some of the early predictions of the medal winners may not be accurate, more so than usual because of the delayed start of the Games.

Below are just the top-10 positions from each prediction model that we have found. The method used to predict the winners varies, some are from scholars using economics and a range of factors to base their prediction, while others use recent competition results and possibly a bit of gut feeling. Once the actual results are known, we will assess the accuracy of the prediction equations.

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Where there has been more than one prediction overtime (such as for Gracenote), only the most recent prediction is shown. There are two sets of tables, one for predictions of the total gold medals won, the other for predicted total overall medals won. See more details about each of these prediction models here.

Predicted Gold Medal Tally

No surprise here, USA and China were predicted to top the gold medal table by all prediction models (and they got it right!) though the margin of one was much less than expected. Host country Japan was correctly predicted to be very successful (they finished third), as is often the case with the host country.

Table of predicted top 10 countries with TOTAL GOLD medals won

Predicted Total Medal Tally

No surprise here, USA and China were also predicted to top the table of the total medals won in most predictions. They were all right, the USA did win the most medals, with China second.

Table of predicted top 10 countries with TOTAL MEDALS won

References

• Gracenote Sports Virtual Medal Table — This popular Olympic Games medal table prediction can be seen in many media outlets. This predictor uses an algorithm to rank athletes and teams in each Olympic event based on recent competition results (taking into account the result, how recent it is and the level of competition). This data is regularly updated leading up to the Games - see their 2021 prediction changes over time.
• Olympicmedalspredictions - www.olympicmedalspredictions.com (author unknown, data now removed), made predictions based on results from major sporting events leading up to the Games. See their 2021 prediction changes over time.
• University of Groningen - predictions by Fabian ten Kate and Elmer Sterken of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, using an "econometric" approach. Their prediction is based on the results of recent World Championships for the relevant disciplines, supplemented by a factor of the home advantage. Their 2021 prediction was published in dutch: Kate, F. ten and E. Sterken (2021) ESB (Economisch Statistische Berichten / Economic Statistical Reports).
• BEST Sports — predictions of sports results generated by experts using proprietary statistical models. These models are applied in their extensive database of sports results, with the aim of predicting future results. From the BESTSports website. Their predictions are updated every month, the final predictions just prior to the Games is listed. This data is regularly updated leading up to the Games - see their 2021 prediction changes over time.
• Frontiers - Li Feifei, Hopkins Will G., Lipinska Patrycja (2022) Population, economic and geographic predictors of nations' medal tallies at the Pyeongchang and Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics. Front. Sports Act. Living 4:931817. They estimated and adjusted for the effects of total population, economy expressed as gross domestic product per capita, absolute latitude and Muslim population proportion on total medal counts. The medal count is rounded to the nearest whole number.
• Towards Data Science - from the article "The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Champions, Predicting the Medal Table of the Summer Games" by Adam C Dick, published 28 July 2019. The features he included for predicting medal counts were athletes, events, athletes per event, summer games, outlier nations, host nation.
• Totallympics - a simple ranking based on the current world champions for each event/sport. There will be changes as time progresses and more world championships are undertaken. See website. (last updated at the end of 2019)
• Financial Times - from the article "Tokyo Olympics Alternative medals table" Financial Times 2021. Data and analysis by John Burn-Murdoch, Martin Stabe and Kazuhiro Kida, using an ecconomic prediction model first developed by Julia Bredtmann, Carsten J. Crede, Sebastian Otten. The factors used included population size, GDP per capita and past results.
• Bleacher Report - from the article "Olympics Predictions 2021: Predicting Tokyo's Final Medal Count: by Joe Tansey on the Bleacher Report website.

Other predicitons not analyzed

• Schlembach, C., Schmidt, S.L., Schreyer, D., & Wunderlich, L. (2020). Forecasting the Olympic Medal Distribution during a Pandemic: A Socio-Economic Machine Learning Model. ERN: Statistical Decision Theory; Operations Research (Topic).
• Schlembach, C., Schmidt, S.L., Schreyer, D., & Wunderlich, L. (2021). Forecasting the Olympic medal distribution – A socioeconomic machine learning model. Technological Forecasting and Social Change.

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Related Pages

• About Predicted Medal Tables
• 2021 prediction changes over time for Gracenote and Olympicmedalspredictions and Bestsports
• More Medal Tallies from each Olympic year
• See more about the Olympics Games in 2021