Commonwealth vs Olympic Games

The Olympic Games are the biggest sporting event in the world. Here is how the Commonwealth Games compares.

TOPIC
COMMONWEALTH GAMES
OLYMPIC GAMES

Size
Participation of approximately 4,500 athletes and 1,500 officials.
Participation of approximately 10,000 athletes and 5,000 officials.

Duration of the Games
Approximately 10 days.
Approximately 17 days.

Countries Included
Commonwealth countries. These countries have a history of British colonization and are registered under the Commonwealth Act.
All countries of the world are eligible to participate in the Olympic Games.

Sports Included

The sports at the Commonwealth Games have predominantly been individual sports although the 1998 Games in Kuala Lumpur introduced a number of team sports into the program. There are 17 sports on the program for Glasgow 2014.

These sports have been on the CG program, but never at the Olympics.

• Lawn Bowls
• Netball
• Squash
• Tenpin Bowling

The number of sports has generally increased at every Olympic Games due to an increasing number of sports being played on a worldwide basis. There were 28 sports on the Rio 2016 program.

Related Pages

• The Olympic Games