The World Athletics Ultimate Championship in 2026 is the inaugural edition of a new worldwide competition that takes place in Budapest, Hungary between the 11th-13th of September. Find the competition's schedule, entries, tv info and results here.
The Ultimate Championship is a new competition by World Athletics, where the world's best athletes face off against each other to see who's really the world's best. This will be the first World Athletics Ultimate Championship ever.
Only the absolutely top athletes have earned their way to Budapest. Invites have been extended to Olympic champions from Paris 2024, Tokyo's 2025 World champions, the winners of each discipline in the
Diamond League 2026 along with this years best athletes from the rankings. In addition, there are also some wild card entries, with hosts Hungary allowed to name several.
The 100m-800m events will feature 16 athletes, between the 1500m-5000m each discipline has 12 entries, while when it comes to field events the crowd will enjoy 8 of the world's best sportsmen and -women.
The World Athletics Ultimate Championship is all about merit, which is why there are no limits on the number of athletes per country - only the best get to compete. The inaugural edition of the competition takes place between the 11th and 13th of September in Hungary's Budapest-
The athletes will be competing for a share of a massive 10 million dollar prize pool. You can watch the whole Ultimate Championship live on tv in the UK via the BBC.
World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 - Schedule
The competition takes place in Budapest between three days from Friday to Sunday from the 11th to the 13th of September 2026. You can find the full World Athletics Ultimate Championships schedule below.
Fri 11 September
| Time | Discipline |
| 18:08 | Mixed relay 4 x 100 m final |
| 18:13 | W High jump final |
| 18:19 | M 400 m semi-finals |
| 18:23 | M Hammer throw final |
| 18:38 | W 400 m semi-finals |
| 19:04 | W 100 m hurdles semi-finals |
| 19:08 | M Pole vault final |
| 19:21 | M 110 m hurdles semi-finals |
| 19:36 | M 5000 m final |
| 19:53 | W Long jump final |
| 19:57 | W 800 m semi-finals |
| 20:20 | W 100 m hurdles final |
| 20:49 | M 110 m hurdles final |
Sat 12 September
| Time | Discipline |
| 17:08 | W 400 m final |
| 17:13 | W Javelin throw final |
| 17:18 | M 400 m final |
| 17:26 | M 800 m semi-finals |
| 17:43 | W Pole vault final |
| 17:46 | W 400 m hurdles semi-finals |
| 18:04 | W 100 m semi-finals |
| 18:21 | M 100 m semi-finals |
| 18:36 | M 1500 m final |
| 18:44 | M Long jump final |
| 18:57 | W 400 m hurdles semi-finals |
| 19:18 | W 800 m final |
| 19:38 | W 100 m final |
| 19:49 | M 100 m final |
Sun 13 September
| Time | Discipline |
| 17:08 | W 400 m hurdles final |
| 17:13 | M Javelin throw final |
| 17:18 | M 200 m semi-finals |
| 17:36 | M 400 m hurdles final |
| 17:44 | W 200 m semi-finals |
| 18:04 | M High jump final |
| 18:10 | W 5000 m final |
| 18:34 | W Triple jump final |
| 18:41 | M 800 m final |
| 18:53 | Mixed relay 4 x 400 m final |
| 19:10 | M 1500 m final |
| 19:38 | M 200 m final |
| 19:49 | W 200 m final |
World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 - TV & livestream
You can watch the entire World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 on tv & livestream for free courtesy of the BBC and its iPlayer. The first broadcast on mainline channels will be on Friday, when BBC Two shows the first day of the competition beginning at 18:00.
The rest of the tv slots haven't been confirmed as of yet, but one would imagine they follow the same pattern. The only difference is that the competition starts at 17:08 on Saturday and Sunday instead of Friday's 18:08, so one would imagine that logically the broadcast begins at 17:00 on the two latter days.
The Ultimate Championship will be a special event when it comes to tv, since the whole schedule of the competition caters specifically to tv audiences. The broadcast will feature special new graphics with augmented reality features, data points on the events including probabilities on winners and different live finishing position predictions.
The event will be more like a show compared to a traditional athletics event, with everything covering a script instead of a normal timetable. This means that no second of the Ultimate Championship will be boring or filler, with something interesting to watch every single second.
World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 - Entries
You can find the full entry lists for the World Athletics Ultimate Championships in 2026 via the link below now taht they've been confirmed. For each event, at least the 2024 Olympic Champions, the 2025 World Champions and the 2026 Diamond League Champions have been invited.
Check out:
All athletes & entry lists at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026
World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 - Results
You can find a results link to the competition here once it starts.
World Athletics Ultimate Championship 2026 - Prize Money
The athletes at the inaugural Ultimate Championship event are battling over the biggest prize pool in athletics history. Each winner of an individual event receives a staggering 150 000 dollars.
Prizes
| Placement | Individual Disciplines | Relays |
| 1 | $150,000 | $80,000 |
| 2 | $75,000 | $40,000 |
| 3 | $40,000 | $24,000 |
| 4 | $25,000 | $20,000 |
| 5 | $16,000 | $16,000 |
| 6 | $14,000 | $14,000 |
| 7 | $12,000 | $10,000 |
| 8 | $10,000 | $8,000 |
| 9 | $9,000 | |
| 10 | $8,000 | |
| 11 | $7,000 | |
| 12 | $6,000 | |
| 13 | $5,000 | |
| 14 | $4,000 | |
| 15 | $3,000 | |
| 16 | $2,000 | |
