After more than two weeks of competition, the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris came to an end on Sunday.
The U.S. women’s basketball team beat France to win gold on Sunday morning, giving the country the top spot in the medal count. The U.S. was tied with China with 40 gold medals, but finished on top for the fourth consecutive Summer Olympics by winning the silver medal count, 44-27. Team USA totaled 126 medals, 35 more than China, which had the second-most medals overall. China was the last country to win more medals than the U.S. at a Summer Olympics when it hosted the 2008 Games in Beijing.
Overall, the Games represented a rebound from the COVID-19-marred 2021 Tokyo Olympics: fans returned to events in droves, brands were able to get involved on-site, social media was abuzz due to several rising stars – and controversial topics – and viewership rebounded dramatically for NBC.
Gold for NBCU
A few weeks after acquiring the media rights to the NBA, NBCU followed up with a successful presentation of the Paris Games. The network had a strong overall presentation, starting with a number of commentators such as Mike Tirico and Noah Eagle and the addition of Goldzone on Peacock and even the integration of Snoop Dogg.
The final Saturday in Paris – which featured the gold medal triumphs of the U.S. men’s basketball and soccer teams in the U.S. state of California – reached 30.7 million viewers, almost three times as many as the comparable Saturday in Tokyo in 2021, according to NBC.
The U.S. men’s basketball team’s victory over host nation France averaged 19.5 million viewers – the highest viewership for a gold medal basketball game since the 1996 Athens Olympics and over eight million more than the average 2024 NBA Finals game. The USWNT’s victory over Brazil averaged nine million viewers – the highest viewership for a soccer final since the 2004 Athens Olympics.
While Sunday’s viewership numbers have not yet been released, viewership in the 16 days since the opening ceremony on July 26 stands at 31.3 million, an 82% increase from Tokyo.
NBCU’s viewership calculations for the Paris Olympics could be considered inflated because they combine primetime viewership in the U.S. and France. Nevertheless, it’s a success for the network – especially because NBCU renewed its Olympic rights deals through 2032 in 2014.
Cash transport
While the Olympics attract many millionaire professional athletes, participating in the Olympics is not necessarily a guarantee of a big payday—or even a permanent income.
This year, athletics was the first sport in which the winners received a prize from the sport’s governing body: each gold medalist received prize money of US$50,000.
Most countries offer their athletes prizes for winning medals. In the case of Hong Kong, which has two gold medalists in fencing, épée Man Wai Vivian Kong and foil Cheung Ka Long, these amount to as much as US$768,000.
For the United States, medal prizes were $37,500 for gold, $22,500 for silver and $15,000 for bronze. Some teams received performance awards from their committees, such as the U.S. swim team, which distributed $250,000 in prize money to 48 swimmers.
Some athletes also received non-cash prizes from their countries, either from the government or through private donations. Carlos Yulo of the Philippines, who won two gold medals in gymnastics, received a house and land, a furnished condominium and free ramen.
