Talk:List of IOC country codes

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Olympics parade[edit]

At the Olympics the UK always parades alphabetically with the G's, and athletics commentators are now refering to the national team as Great Britain And Northern Ireland (when they have enough breath), so I have altered the list to reflect this. Andy G 23:14, 9 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Anyone know about the Isle of Man & Channel Islands? Andy G 01:41, 9 Jan 2004 (UTC)

AFAIK, they do not have NOCs, and only compete separately in the Commonwealth Games.

I removed the note about there being a unified Korea team - they did walk together in the opening ceremony, but they still compete as separate teams. sjorford 08:22, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Is this ISO?[edit]

Do these match the ISO_3166-1 alpha-3 codes? If so we should add a link 67.86.150.45 13:54, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

No, quite a few of them are different. I've added a link anyway, though, for comparison. sjorford 14:19, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

GBR[edit]

This article is explaining what countries the codes stand for. If this was an article explaining the IOC's own private list of countries it would be acceptable to use a made up country name to explain the code, but it's not, it's explaining what countries the code stands for--using a non existant name does not explain that. Joe D (t) 17:30, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • It essentially is the IOC's own private list of countries, as many of the entities are not actually countries but compete as such only in the Olympics. Also, just because the IOC shortens the official name "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" differently than most usages doesn't mean that their usage is any more non-existant than the more common shortening. I've revamped the article to show both IOC usage and common usage. -- Jonel | Speak 20:24, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I like the new version, Thanks. Joe D (t) 20:40, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Redundancy[edit]

There's really no reason to have two separate columns for "IOC designation" and "Nation" since there's only a handful of differences between the two. A much better way is to have one column in which you point out the differences when necessary. Not only does that save space, but it makes the differences more obvious. (I'll make this change eventually if no one objects or does it first.) - dcljr (talk) 01:14, 16 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, since no one said anything, I've gone ahead and altered the article to try out this idea: [1] ("permanent" link provided in case someone has reverted the article to its previous state). I've retained the original "IOC designations" as HTML comments in the source so that editors can compare the template-based "Nation" names to the original IOC names and point out any differences in the table, as I have done with, for example, Brunei. Comments? - dcljr (talk) 00:33, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Looks great. -- Jonel | Speak 03:32, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Great, only you have lost some oddities, like ZZX, the Mixed Team; SAA, the Saar (1947-1957); IOP, the "Independent Olympic Participant" and IOA, the "Individual Olympic Athlete". Can you put back the ones that are not merged into the first table, please. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:52, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm. Well, I didn't remove those, but I'll take a look through past edits and try to find them. - dcljr (talk) 20:41, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Oops, heh... yes, I did remove those. In my last edit, I didn't realize I was editing the entire article instead of just the first table, so I accidentally (cut-and-) pasted over the entire second table. Sorry. - dcljr (talk) 20:57, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Repaired it. +added 95% font-size (cfr. {{prettytable}} Bart l 22:03, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. My attempted edits kept failing... - dcljr (talk) 22:11, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I still can't bring up the edit page on this article, even though I can edit other articles and talk pages (including, of course, this one). Weird... - dcljr (talk) 22:30, 20 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

WP:FLC[edit]

This list is looking good, but will need some references to be nominated as a featured list. Can anyone help? -- ALoan (Talk) 20:00, 19 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

What is the correct name of the UK's Olympic team?[edit]

Is the UK's Olympic team "Great Britain" or "Great Britain and Northern Ireland"?

see Cfd discussion: Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion#Category:Great_Britain_at_the_Olympics_to_Category:Great_Britain_and_Northern_Ireland_at_the_Olympics --Mais oui! 23:03, 17 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]


How can Croatia be part of "YUG" from 1912, when the YUG team (then Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes) was established in 1918??? Croatian athletes up to 1918 competed under Hungarian/Austrian teams since the country was part of Austro-Hungary!!!

Commonwealth games, why?[edit]

Why is the list currently being cluttered up by commonwealth games teams that have never participated in any olympic games? The CG has nothing to do with the IOC. Since the different games use different codes, it just makes things confusing. IMO, there could be a completely different article about the codes used at the CG, but they do not belong here. /Kriko 12:34, 23 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I totally agree with this. Jersey, Guernesey and so... are not identified with a code given by the IOC. And I think, they won't never have one. Commonwealth games are not Olympic games, and confuse the codes is not a good thing. Khardan 00:44, 26 February 2006 (UTC).[reply]

Usefulness of wikilinks on 3 letter codes[edit]

I am questioning the usefulness of the wikilinks on the codes in the first column of the table. They all seem to point either to a redirect page to the country article (which is already wikilinked from the country name in the second column), or they point to a disambiguation page for the three letter acroynm. In either case, they don't appear to be very useful. Unless someone can provide a good reason to keep them, I'd like to delete the wikilinks for the first column, so as to reduce the confusing navigational structure. Comments? Andrwsc 08:18, 13 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You make a good point. Since the country name already links to what the 3 letter acronym will, in theory, link to, I would have to agree; its just confusing to have two links on the same page to the same thing. If you could change it, that'd be great! --J@red [T]/[+] 20:33, 13 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree, these might as well be removed. I tried to at least redirect one of them to the specific country page instead of a disambiguation page, and the change was reverted. Really, what's the usefulness of having a three-letter acronym that intentionally points to a disambiguation page that refers to computer-related stuff and a Star Trek character? (ROM in this case, for Romania). --Maelwys 18:26, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Nuke 'em. Delink them all. -- Jonel | Speak 23:03, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Summer Olympics only?[edit]

Regarding the notes, are Winter Olympics ignored? — Instantnood 19:47, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

They appear to be, yes; however, I am not aware of that being a conscious decision. I would say the notes should include information about Winter Olympics. -- Jonel | Speak 21:12, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly. Or else the fact that Winter Olympics are not included should be noted in the leading paragraphs. — Instantnood 21:45, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
They are possibly excluded but I don't know. Bear in mind however that the winter olympics did not start until 1924 and occured during the same year as the summer olympics until (and including) 1992. Also note that countries like East Timor some other Asian and African countries almost definitely did not take part in the winter olympics. Nil Einne 23:51, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it's a good thing they were held in the same years as the Summer Olympics. If there's anything wrong we've fix 15 years only. — Instantnood 13:03, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have included the Winter Games in the German version of this table Citius Altius Fortius 19:13, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

FYROM not part of Serbia for 1912 Games[edit]

The Games were held from May to July of 1912, while Serbia only acquired the territory of the present-day FYROM after the outbreak of the First Balkan War in October of that year.--211.28.181.102 08:49, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

<cite id=?>... why were they removed?[edit]

Why were the <cite> tags removed from the codes starting at the beginning of the letter. It was an IP user, new, who did it, so I'm sure he/she didn't know what they were doing. But it made so that the TOC doesn't work. Could someone with admin powers rollback those edits? Thanks. → J@red  19:47, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Montenegro?[edit]

The inclusion of Montenegro here is somewhat suspicious given there is no ISO code for that country yet. Is there a source for this? doktorb | words 22:55, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I know, there isn't. —Nightstallion (?) 05:40, 22 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Myanmar[edit]

Burma has changed its name in 1989 - therefore it participated as Mynamar in 1992 already --Citius Altius Fortius 21:27, 8 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Zimbabwe, Zambia, Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia, Southern Rhodesian[edit]

can somebody help me? According wikiepdia Southern Rhodesia had become Rhodesia - later Rhodesia became Zimbabwe after independency - according the table here it looks like that out of Rhodesia became after seperation in 1964 Northern and Southern Rhodesia - that is strange Citius Altius Fortius 19:11, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The separate listing of Southern Rhodesia for 1964 is highly suspicious. The IOC never recognized them under this name, nor did the Tokyo OCOG. They were recognized simply as Rhodesia with the abbreviation RHO having been assigned by the Tokyo OCOG.

The separate listing of Northern Rhodesia is correct, however the abbreviation assigned by the Tokyo OCOG was NRH.

It is important to note that the OCOG's assigned the abbreviations from 1952 to 1972. The first Games with IOC-standardized abbreviations were the Innsbruck Winter Games of 1976. No abbreviations were used prior to 1952.

This information can be found at www.aafla.org and in particular, www.aafla.org/SportsLibrary/JOH/JOHv12n2/johv12n2l.pdf, an excellent article by Olympic historian Bill Mallon.

The difficulty in compiling this list for Wikipedia, is in choosing whether to list the codes that were in actual use at the time, or go with the codes that the IOC has retroactively applied.

It seems in some cases, we use the retroactive codes (EUA, ZZX, BWI, etc.); some cases we use the actual codes (SAU, NGU, HOL, etc.); and some cases we guess when we're not sure (SER, BOR). Joel225sp 05:21, 17 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That's a great article you've found! I've got a working copy of a re-write of this article, and I painstakingly went through all the official reports and built a spreadsheet of code usage, so it's useful to see another reference for comparison. Andrwsc 20:39, 17 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! Not to question Mallon's article, but a case could be made for standardization in 1972 instead of 1976. The only code change from 72 to 76 (not involving a country-name change) is Korea from COR to KOR. It's KOR in Sapporo, COR in Munich, then KOR in Innsbruck and KOR ever since. Certainly, none of the Munich abbreviations are German. They're all English or French. (In fact all standardized abbreviations were English or French until 1991 when HOL became NED.)
It would appear that an effort toward standardization was made at Grenoble, as there are eight abbreviations that are English and not French: BRA, NKO, HUN, KOR, SAF, SPA, SWE, USA. However this is totally ignored at Mexico City, as all abbreviations are Spanish.
It is likely that in the cases of Grenoble, Sapporo and Munich, efforts were made by the OCOG's to standardize and that the IOC officially gave their sanction of these at some point between Munich and Innsbruck.
The only omissions from Mallon's article are Gold Coast (1952) and North Borneo (1956). Unfortunately, this cannot be found in the official reports.Joel225sp 23:47, 22 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ceylon country code[edit]

Sri Lanka was called Ceylon before 1972, so it's extremely unlikely that it used the country code SRI already in 1948. Punkmorten 15:17, 27 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

IOC medalist database isn't helpful (uses SRI for the 1948 medal), nor are the '48, '52, or '56 official reports. The '60 report is... well... PBA and SUA and GIA anyone (Ceylon is CEY)? Those are HOL, EUA, and JPN in the '68 report (Ceylon is CEI). I'm becoming less convinced of the accuracy of the whole "first use" column... -- Jonel | Speak 00:55, 28 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Also, Suriname was known as Dutch Guiana in 1968 and probably didn't use the code SUR until 1976.

Netherlands Antilles[edit]

According to this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands_Antilles_at_the_2004_Summer_Olympics the Netherlands Antilles first competed in 1952, not 1960. What was the country code for Netherlands Antilles in 1952?


Also, is it confirmed that their country code is obsolete? Their NOC homepage makes no mention of this (yet). The same is true about the IOC's page -- it still has AHO listed.

Montenegro II[edit]

Now the Alpha-2 and -3 codes for Montenegro have been officially disclosed, is the IOC code likely to be the same...? Or are we still waiting for this? doktorb wordsdeeds 09:05, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You mean the ISO alpha-2 and alpha-3 codes? The IOC is a separate organization from the ISO. You'll have to check the status of the IOC recognition of Montenegro. (SEWilco 14:42, 28 September 2006 (UTC))[reply]

Greenland[edit]

Does anybody know if Greenland has its own IOC code or if it uses the Danish one? It looks like the Faroe Islands has a code of its own. Valentinian (talk) / (contribs) 09:39, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In this list are some codes which are not the IOC condes - f.e.: Faroe, Gibraltar, Alderney, Nolfolk Island (there are some british, danish or australian colonies/dependencies which are not recognised) Citius Altius Fortius 17:51, 4 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This page should only show IOC codes, and not any three-letter code used by any other sporting organization. An update to this page is on my "to do list". Andrwsc 18:33, 4 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Serbia (again, heh)[edit]

The top of the article says SRB; the bottom SER. Which is right? doktorb wordsdeeds 13:36, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The IOC says it's SRB [2] Eron 14:29, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
We need a reference for what the IOC used for the 1912 appearance. Country codes were not used at that time. Certainly it looks like SRB is the code for the current Serbia (successor to SCG). I will make the necessary changes for the 1912 appearance if we can't find any evidence for "SER" being used in the past few years to refer to the "old Serbia". Andrwsc 19:59, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, they didn't win any medals in 1912 and thus the IOC medalist database doesn't have it. The database does seem to distinguish between old Serbia and new Serbia, suggesting that the IOC uses different codes for the two. Also (while I'm poking around 1912), it seems that pre-Soviet "Russia" is identified by the code RU1 while the modern "Russian Federation" is RUS. -- Jonel | Speak 22:59, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that RU1 code is strange. However, I think our decision to use RUS for both periods on Wikipedia is the right one, with GER as precedent. Back to SER/SRB, I think I shall make the changes to the 1912 SER. I have a feeling that "SER" was assumed by a previous editor with no actual source, but kept because we needed something. I think SAA and BOR might fall into that category too. Andrwsc 00:05, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I believe that the IOC actually considers pre-WW2 Germany as the same entity as post re-unification Germany, while the two Russias are distinct. If you search the database for all years under "Germany", you get 1896-1932 and 1952-2006. However, if you search under "Russian Federation" you get only 1994-2006 while "Russia" gives you 1908-1912. Also, the NOC creation dates for Germany and for Russia also give that support. As for Serbia and such, I would say that unless we have a direct source, we should give the code as "unknown" or something to that effect. -- Jonel | Speak 00:24, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Not to throw another monkey wrench into our inexact science, but... At the time of stadardization (mid-1970's), all the abbreviations were either English or French. In other words, SRB would not have been allowed at the 1976 Games in Innsbruck or Montreal. SER would have been used because it is consistent with both the English and French spellings.

Spellings that reflect the languages of the individual NOC's were not seen until 1991 when HOL became NED. Soon after, many others appeared--such as BIH, MKD, SCG, and finally, SRB.

So I think it is entirely permissible to list this Pre-WWI Serbia as SER.

I'm not going to edit the page. I'm just presenting another viewpoint.  :) Joel225sp 00:12, 23 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Malaysia IOC country code[edit]

According to the article, Malaysia IOC code is MAS and its first use is in 1956. However, Malaysia is not formed until 1963. --Joshua Chiew 16:03, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This article needs some cleanup (I have some plans). With respect to Malaysia, MAS was not used as the code until 1992. MAL was the code from 1964-1988. MAL was also used by "Malaya" at the 1960 Games, and Malaya first competed in 1956 (codes were not used then). Therefore, I think the current revision of this article is mixing up a few concepts: the current code for Malaysis is MAS, and Malaysian athletes have competed at the Olympics since 1956 if you count the appearances by Malaya (and North Borneo, for that matter) in 1956. Andrwsc 19:55, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Oddly enough, if you go to the IOC medalist database, select continent "Asia" and scroll down to "North Bornéo" under the country menu, it points to Brunei rather than Malaysia. Which doesn't really make much sense to me. (Then again, quite a lot of the IOC results don't make much sense...) -- Jonel | Speak 23:09, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

AHO[edit]

Why has AHO been moved to "obsolete codes", when it clearly isn't until at least 2007...? doktorb wordsdeeds 08:37, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know; I reverted it. —Nightstallion (?) 12:40, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion at MoS on flag icons[edit]

Please contribute to the discussion on flag icons at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Flag icons - manual of style entry?. (SEWilco 14:55, 15 January 2007 (UTC))[reply]

Alphabetical by country name[edit]

The list should be arranged by alphabetical order of the country's names not by alphabetically by the codes. As Spain appears in the "e" section. It makes it necessary to use the "find." Most people look for the country to see the code, not look for the code to see what country it is

4.143.227.229 06:03, 9 April 2007 (UTC)It Just Makes sense.[reply]

As it is a list of the codes, I think it makes sense to have it listed by code, but I have made the table sortable so that they can be sorted by code, name or date, so you can have it in either order. mattbr 11:48, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

if list was once sortable (as indicated by mattbr's note above, it is no longer. can it be please?68.173.2.68 (talk) 10:43, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Montenegro III[edit]

The IOC really are dragging their heels over the Montenegro code, eh? Any update on this from a source at all..? doktorb wordsdeeds 17:34, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You'll know it's official from the IOC when this link actually works. They have updated Romania to ROU, have Serbia as SRB, and have Marshall Islands as MHL already, so there is visible evidence that this part of the website is not stale. Andrwsc 18:50, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The link works, its now official. --Howard the Duck 11:20, 10 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This shows how Wiki can make you behave - I emailed the IOC (I know, I know) and got the reply that the Montenegro code will be confirmed after the Guatemala meeting in July. So now we know - the two options seem to be either MGO or MNE, the former already on some sports results sites, the latter the ISO code. doktorb wordsdeeds 17:29, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Portugal and ex-colonies[edit]

I think that portuguese ex-colonies should mention that status, as many athleths from these countries participated in Olympic Games representing Portugal. The countries are: Angola, Cabo Verde, Moçambique, São Tomé e Príncipe, Guiné-Bissau, Macau (China) and Goa, Damão e Diu (India). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.26.211.160 (talk) 00:40, August 30, 2007 (UTC)

Honestly, I think all these "XXX is part of YYY" should be removed. There are so many more that you can consider adding, like "Pakistan was part of India", "South Korea was part of Japan", "Angola was part of Portugal", etc., that you need a degree in political history to complete. If we're just considering the NOCs, then just say when it starts to participate in the Olympics, and that will save us a lot of brain cells. Chanheigeorge 20:31, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I totally agree. I have on my "to do list" for months and months a plan to turn this list back into a list only about the country codes, and put the list of participation somewhere else. Andrwsc 20:33, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

KIT for Italy[edit]

Can anyone explain KIT for Italy, up to 1936? It does not appear to be English or French (the two IOC languages), nor does it appear to be Italian. Any reliable sources out there? Joel225sp 06:08, 17 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Kingdom of Italy? (this one) --necronudist 16:15, 17 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, that must be it--but we still don't know the source. Interestingly, the IOC makes no distinction between "Kingdom of Italy" and modern Italy. Results for 1936 and prior years list ITA only. Thanks! Joel225sp 19:30, 17 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

February 2008 re-write[edit]

This list has been problematic for a long time, mostly because it confuses two concepts:

  1. the use of country codes to identify NOCs,
  2. the participation of those NOCs in past Games.

The confusion has resulted in nonsense such as (in the entry for AUS) "current usage resumed 1920", when it would be several decades later before any country codes were used in the first place! I have recently created List of participating nations at the Summer Olympic Games and List of participating nations at the Winter Olympic Games, each with copious footnotes and fully referenced, to address that half of the equation. I have also rewritten this list to focus exclusively on the codes themselves, as that is the topic of this list in the first place. I have also fully referenced this list with pointers to all the official reports that clearly show the code usage at the time, and to the IOC web page for each of the current 205 NOCs. I would like to think this list can soon be nominated as a featured list. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 20:45, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

BAD?[edit]

The article sais the code for Barbados in 1964 was BAD. But Barbados did not compete in 1964... So??? 81.224.188.11 (talk) 23:03, 8 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The official report of the 1964 games (on page 9 of this PDF file) shows BAD for Barbados, so that's why it shows in this table. But I see your point about why it should be removed. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:05, 11 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Macau?[edit]

Macau are taking part in the 2008 Paralympics in Beijing. It took me by surprise given what I know about their NOC (or lack of!) but we cannot argue with fact. Should I add Macau and their apparant IOC code to the list? Or will this cause all manner of issues? doktorb wordsdeeds 16:21, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Faeroe Islands also compete in the Paralympic Games but not as a separate entity in the Olympic Games. - fchd (talk) 16:25, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What do you recommend? An entry for both with a footnote? Or passing reference in the text but not part of the main table? doktorb wordsdeeds 16:31, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Since none of the existing references mention them, and there is no page on the IOC website such as the 205 pages linked from the "Ref" column in these tables, I would suggest a reference in the text might be most appropriate. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:06, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Macau and Faroe Islands probably both have an NOC: it's just not recognized by the IOC (yet?). That they are recognized by the IPC, and some of the IFs (e.g. they are both FINA members), indicates they were/are attempting to gain IOC NOC status. Macau's ability to become an NOC, however, was hurt when it became a part of China. (Hong Kong may/may not fall into this as well, but their NOC status was obtained when the British oversaw them.) Hooperswim (talk) 22:02, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I have a re-write of National Olympic Committee in the works, and it touches on those issues. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 22:20, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Macau should be included. They have also competed in Asian Games, East Asian Games, FIFA, FIBA, FIVB, ITTF and BWF tournaments. 2sc945 (talk) 09:40, 23 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Uncoded[edit]

Bosnia and Herzegovina[edit]

What about this country? What code does it have? Henkt (talk) 21:55, 4 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The list clearly shows BIH. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 22:04, 4 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Kosova (or Kosovo)[edit]

?? 113.22.176.102 (talk) 05:11, 30 July 2009 (UTC).[reply]

Not yet recognized by the IOC. When their NOC appears on this page, we can add it to this list. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 06:36, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

POM[edit]

In the prelims of the men's 100 free at the 2009 World Aquatics Championships I noticed an NOC code "POM" used (see Heats 7&8). What country does this stand for? —Preceding unsigned comment added by FeinerMax (talk • contribs) 07:12, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

French Polynesia. -- Jonel (Speak to me) 12:35, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It should be noted that it is not an IOC code, so should not appear on this list. French Polynesia does not have a National Olympic Committee, but apparently has distinct entries from France for FINA events, it would seem. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:25, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely correct. -- Jonel (Speak to me) 04:43, 31 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. --FeinerMax (talk) 07:05, 31 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It should also be noted that "POM" is not the FINA code for the territory: Tahiti (TAH) is the FINA member. My guess is that the French departmental code was mistakenly submitted on the entry and not changed by the event organizers. Hooperswim (talk) 21:51, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Saar code[edit]

Why does Saar not have a code in List_of_IOC_country_codes#Historic_NOCs_and_teams's section "Obsolete teams"? The article Saar at the 1952 Summer Olympics has the code SAA for them. North Borneo does not have a code either, but North Borneo at the 1956 Summer Olympics has NBO.
Started to check the other missing ones, and British Guiana at the 1952 Summer Olympics has the code GUY, so it is not obsolete although British Guiana is. And the same thing for Gold Coast. Because the article's name is "List of IOC country codes", they should not be there as it seems they didn't have a code at the time. 82.141.118.200 (talk) 06:16, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Historic codes[edit]

I noticed the addition of RU1 and a couple of others in Historic codes. It is a good addition, but in the paragraphs under the table, there should be some sort of explanation for why these codes exist, especially the ones that are unusual (such as including a numeral). Thank you.    → Michael J Ⓣ Ⓒ Ⓜ 23:17, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Flag icons[edit]

Is there any reason why the flag icons of some countries like South Korea & Iran different from their national flags? Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Xdyj (talk • contribs) 01:25, 28 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For both South Korea and Iran, it's really their national flags displayed (File:Flag of South Korea.svg and File:Flag of Iran.svg, respectively). The flag icons may look different though because they're displayed at a very small size. It may also have something to do with the SVG code of the flags. SiBr4 (talk) 11:20, 28 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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Why doesn't IOC use ISO codes?[edit]

I just stumbled upon this article as I had this question, but unfortunately there is no information about this. Is there any particular good reason why IOC is not using ISO codes? This only creates a lot of confusion when they have some of the codes differently, but the whole world in other areas is using ISO standards. Maybe someone who knows better about this could add this information to the article. Thanks for the good work! --62.65.226.146 (talk) 15:46, 20 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

ISO 3166 didn't exist until 1974 (and was very little known to the general public before the rise of the international Internet in the second half of the 1990s). A version of the current Olympic system had been more or less worked out before 1974... AnonMoos (talk) 10:34, 25 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Because there are many Olympic delegations which do not conform with a geopolitical entity and their ISO-codes. For instance: Unified team, Olympic Athlete of Russia, Independent Olympic Athletes, Korea, Chinese Taipei,... -- 22:22, 6 April 2018 Tvx1
Also IOC codes are used for historical results in the Olympics "hall of fame". Nations may disappear or split geopolitically (and in ISO 3166) but do not disappear in Olympics history. You have to understand that this is a different classification system: the IOC codes do not indicate geopolitical countries or territories (like ISO 3166) but Olympic committes or special teams (which are never split by nationality of participants, when they compete together in the same team which remains officially united; this also applies for the former United Team of Germany, or the former Czechoslovakia, or th former Soviet Union, and several other joint teams grouping several NOCs: in all cases they do not represent a particular nation but all of them at the same time).
Using ISO 3166 codes in sport to designate teams or competitors in sport competitions would create much more confusion (and it would be false)! verdy_p (talk) 19:55, 8 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

French language[edit]

Because I noticed a wrong spelling in the French word "Arab(i)e saoudite", I just added the missing i, and by the way, I explained also the origin of HBR code (Honduras britannique), as it was done for many other IOC codes with a French origin. French is the first official language of the Games and that needs to be explained. For example, the new name of EOR comes from Équipe olympique des réfugiés and replace Refugee Olympic Team (ROT).--Arorae (talk) 04:38, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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What Games should count for this list?[edit]

This is in reference to the Iroquois/Haudenosaunee receiving their own code (HNL) at the 2022 World Games, which is officially recognized by the IOC.

Should we then count all sporting organizations which are recognized by the IOC? Or is there some subset we should stick to? If so, why?

Including the Olympics is a given. Adding the Paralympics (Macau and Faroe Islands) seems pretty much uncontroversial. Adding the World Games brings the number of Games to 3. Do we keep going or stop at a specific point? The full list of organizations recognized by the IOC is quite long. For example:

  • Do we include IAAF's Authorized Neutral Athletes (ANA) and Athlete Refugee Team (ART) in this article?
  • Do we include the Pacific Games' Niue (NIU) and New Caledonia (NCL)? Those pages even say "IOC code" right before (e.g.) NIU.
  • Maybe most controversially, do we include the Commonwealth Games? They're officially recognized by the IOC just as much as the previous entries on this list, and all of the countries that are part of both the Olympics and the CGF agree on country codes, so "why not"? They have their own article for List of CGF country codes, while (e.g.) the Pacific Games doesn't have one - is this just because of the GBR → ENG/SCO/NIR/WAL split or something?

Zowayix001 (talk) 10:33, 22 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Edit: I forgot we also already include special codes for the Youth Olympics and the Asian Games, who have one IOC code (Athletes from Kuwait) that has never shown up at the Olympics or Paralympics. Zowayix001 (talk) 10:37, 22 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Looked into this a little more and it starts to get patently ridiculous if every Games recognized by the IOC is counted. For example, Russia competed as "Russian Boxing Federation" (RBF) at the 2021 AIBA World Boxing Championships, with the Russian Olympic Committee flag and everything. The official results sheet for those games even says "NOC code" next to "RBF". But does this deserve its own table row? Then there are plenty of other similar codes like RAF (Russian Automobile Federation), one for figure skating that I can't remember off the top of my head, etc. Where is the line drawn? We can't arbitrarily say "include a few specific IOC-recognized Games and exclude the rest". Zowayix001 (talk) 11:12, 22 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
My opinion is that we only include games that fulfill all of the following conditions such that we are including only the events that are the most similar to the Olympics proper:
  • The games are recognized by the IOC and use IOC codes or similar.
  • The games are truly global events and not regional or intercommunity events; the amount of nations competing should be equivalent with the Olympics and the competitors should not come from a single subcultural community (such as profession, religion, shared language, being LGBT, etc.), with the exception of parasport events.
  • The games are multi-sport and multi-discipline, separating them from the likes of FIFA World Cups, World Combat Games, and other championships. If an event in question can be condensed down to a single "genre" of sports like "racing sports" or "martial arts", we should exclude them.
I think that would probably cover most of the events out there as to not have to worry about anything but the most significant editions/changes; anything else is would be to specific or too unnotable to list. Including the more "patently ridiculous" examples you mentioned would result in this page basically just becoming a weird list of abbreviations for national governing bodies, which I think we obviously want to avoid here. GreenRunner0 19:52, 13 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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Successor states according to the IOC are a mess[edit]

The "Historic NOCs" section (whether a historical team is treated as its own thing or subsumed into another team) seems to have a major issue in that the IOC themselves are an unreliable source.

I was trying to conclusively determine whether or not the IOC considered the United Arab Republic to be its own thing or subsumed into Egypt/Syria.

  • Moustafa Soheim competed for the United Arab Republic in 1960, and his IOC athlete page shows he competed at Rome 1960. The flag depicted there is a placeholder "grey-and-white Olympic rings" flag with no country name - let's say this represents the IOC treating the UAR separate from Egypt.
  • Osman El-Sayed competed for the United Arab Republic in 1960, and importantly did not compete in either 1964 or 1968 after the United Arab Republic de facto dissolved. His IOC athlete page instead depicts Egypt with Egypt's flag.
  • Finally, if you go to the IOC's list of Rome 1960 athletes, go to Wrestling, and look up silver medals, you'll find Osman El-Sayed apparently competing for the United Arab Emirates with the UAE's flag! This is obviously a typo on the IOC's end, but it still doesn't square with the first two points above.

Second example:

Third example:

On top of all this, it would be trivial for the IOC to update their site and change everything at any time (I think they've already gone through multiple redesigns). With the way pages dynamically load in parts, archiving all possible changes would be very difficult. There are no collated tables across multiple years, nor PDFs of medal tallies, nor anything else that would be easy to archive and difficult to change retroactively.

I'm not sure how to best deal with this.

Zowayix001 (talk) 08:31, 25 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the way we handle it (see here is correct and makes sense. In short, UAR is counted as Egypt's alternate name and participation, Saar and ANZ should be separate entities. Jmj713 (talk) 16:29, 25 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Did any Syrian athletes compete in 1960? That would be a complication. AnonMoos (talk) 19:40, 25 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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