Ranking the Best USA Olympians Since 2000 Heading into the 2024 Paris Games
By the end of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, there will be several new entrants into (and higher risers up) the list of the best U.S. Olympians of all time.
But which multi-medalists thus far have been the 10 best since Y2K?
Here's everything that went into our ranking process:
- Olympic medals (and gold medals, in particular) are, naturally, the majority of the focus here. Kind of hard to call anyone one of the best Olympians if they don't have at least a few pieces of flare.
- Dominance and "iconicness" can provide a significant boost. For instance, Natalie Coughlin won more career Olympic medals than Katie Ledecky (for now), but the latter easily landed ahead of the former by being more unforgettable and by making every other distance swimmer in the world look helpless in her wake.
- Focus is on individuals as opposed to teams, and a medal won individually is given slightly more weight than a medal won via team/relay. However, every medal counts, and we made sure to include some basketball on the list, even though it'd be impossible for those Olympians' medal counts to stack up against the swimmers who can win more than half a dozen golds in a single summer.
- Both Summer and Winter Olympians were considered, though there were substantially more candidates from the former than the latter.
- Medals won before 2000 and medals won in non-Olympic events are not part of the ranking consideration but may be mentioned, where applicable.
Honorable Mentions
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Jenny Thompson, Dara Torres and Gary Hall Jr., Swimming
If you include what these three swimmers accomplished prior to 2000, they perhaps all make the cut. They combined for 34 total medals, half of which were gold. However, nine of those 17 golds were pre-Y2K. That said, the fact that Torres won a pair of silvers in 2008 at 41 years old was unreal. Meanwhile, I'm 37 and need to wear a posture corrector to comfortably sit at a desk for more than an hour.
Aly Raisman and Nastia Liukin, Gymnastics
Two of the best U.S. gymnasts of all time who aren't named Simone Biles. Liukin was sensational in 2008 with five medals, including gold in the individual all-around. Raisman won six medals between 2012 and 2016, including a pair of golds in the team all-around events.
Bode Miller, Alpine Skiing
Apolo Ohno made the cut for the top 10, but the only other Winter Olympian with much of an argument for inclusion was Miller. After two silvers in 2002, his complete lack of podiums in 2006 was one of the more surprising disappointments in recent Olympic history. But he was back in a big way in 2010 for three more medals, including the lone gold (Super Combined) of his career. He came back again in 2014 for one more bronze, good for the second-most Winter Olympic medals in U.S. history.
Nathan Adrian, Aaron Peirsol, Dana Vollmer and Missy Franklin, Swimming
Swimming is kind of our thing. Team USA has won 186 total medals in swimming since 2000, 81 of which were golds. And the individual medal count is considerably higher than that, as we've medaled in 35 out of the 36 relay swims. Factor those "several medals from one team medal" situations into the equation and it's more like 350 total medals and more than 150 gold medals. Needless to say, the bar for cracking the overall top 10 as a swimmer is quite high, and this quartet of five-time gold medalists fell just a bit shy.
Eddy Alvarez and Lauryn Williams, Dual Threats
It's one thing to win medals in multiple swimming disciplines.
But medals in both seasons of the Olympics?
Now that's wild.
Alvarez got a silver in the 5,000m short-track speed skating relay in the 2014 Winter Games and another silver in baseball at the 2020 Summer Games. Williams' Winter Games feat came in the same year as Alvarez's, taking silver in the two-woman bobsleigh event in Sochi. And in the Summer Games, she won gold in the 4x100m relay in 2012 and silver in the 100m in 2004.
T10. Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi, Basketball
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Career Medals (5):
- 5 Gold (Women's basketball in 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020)
In women's basketball, Team USA winning gold is just about as inevitable as it gets.
They've gone 69-1 in the Olympics dating back to 1984, entering Paris on a 55-game winning streak that spans more than three decades.
Better yet, only two of those games were decided by single digits—a four-point win over Russia in the 2004 semifinals and a nine-point win over Nigeria in the 2020 opener, in which Team USA led by 20 after three quarters.
But while there are 10 women who played a part in at least three of those gold medals, Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi are the only basketball players (men or women) with at least five gold medals.
If and when they win it again this year, though, Taurasi will be collecting her tie-breaking sixth medal.
Though she's 42 years old, Taurasi isn't just some honorary captain, either. She's still averaging better than 16 points per game in this her 20th season in the WNBA and will serve as a veteran leader. Only Lisa Leslie (488 points from 1996-2008) has scored more points in the Olympics than Taurasi's 414.
9. Allison Schmitt, Swimming
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Career Medals (10):
- 4 Gold (4x200m freestyle in 2012 and 2016; 200m freestyle in 2012, 4x100m medley in 2012)
- 3 Silver (4x200m freestyle in 2020; 400m freestyle in 2012; 4x100m freestyle in 2016)
- 3 Bronze (4x200m freestyle in 2008; 4x100m freestyle in 2012 and 2020)
Why Allison Schmitt with four gold medals as opposed to any of the five-gold options noted in the honorable mentions?
Well, because "Schmitty" is one of just five swimmers with at least 10 total medals dating back to 2000, all of whom made the cut for our top 10.
It didn't hurt matters that she got her 10 medals over the course of four Olympics, either, which helped with her popularity along the way.
Thanks to her bronze in '08, Schmitt was already someone to watch out for heading into the '12 Games in which she won three golds, a silver and a bronze. Then, for her final four medals, she was already a legend.
Eight of her 10 medals were relay races, and for the 4x100m relays in both 2016 and 2020, she didn't even swim in the final; just the preliminary heat. So there's a fair amount of "shared glory" here with the likes of Katie Ledecky, Missy Franklin, Simone Manuel, Dana Vollmer and others.
Still, 10 medals is quite a feat that the vast majority of swimmers in relay history could only dream of reaching.
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8. Apolo Ohno, Short-Track Speedskating
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Career Medals (8):
- 2 Gold (1500m in 2002; 500m in 2006)
- 2 Silver (1,000m in 2002; 1,500m in 2010)
- 4 Bronze (1,000m in 2006 and 2010; 5,000m relay in 2006 and 2010)
Of the 170 athletes who have won at least seven Olympic medals, only 44 did so on the Winter side of things.
And of those 44, only Apolo Ohno did so as a representative of Team USA.
There are just four short-track speedskating events per gender per year, and you can see all four of them above in Ohno's career medal count: 500 meters, 1000 meters, 1500 meters and the 5000 meter relay—the latter of which is complete chaos of the highest order.
Ohno competed in all 12 of the possible events across his three years in the Olympics, medaling in eight of them.
He was mighty close to several others, too. Team USA placed fourth in the relay in 2002. And in the 500-meter event, he was disqualified in the semifinals in 2002 and in the finals in 2010 for inadvertently causing another skater to fall.
As is, winning eight medals is remarkable, putting him in a tie with South Korea's Viktor Ahn for the most all-time among male short-track speedskaters.
7. Natalie Coughlin, Swimming
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Career Medals (12):
- 3 Gold (100m backstroke in 2004 and 2008; 4x200m freestyle in 2004)
- 4 Silver (4x100m medley in 2004 and 2008; 4x100m freestyle in 2004 and 2008)
- 5 Bronze (100m freestyle in 2004 and 2008; 200m medley in 2008; 4x200m freestyle in 2008; 4x100m freestyle in 2012)
Between 2004 in Athens and 2008 in Beijing, it seemed like Natalie Coughlin never left the pool, winning five medals in the former and six in the latter.
Her events were staggered enough that she never had to swim multiple medal races in the same day, so it wasn't quite like the times when Michael Phelps had maybe an hour to recover in between his quests for gold. But she was swimming something in the morning and something in the evening just about every day.
Were it not for Phelps winning eight medals in each of those Games, Coughlin would have been alone in first place as the top medal recipient each year.
Though she is tied for the second-most career medals in U.S. Olympic history and is still the only woman in Olympic history to win at least six medals in a single Games, it does hurt her case in this ranking a bit that only three of the 12 were gold medals.
Yes, we should all be so lucky as to *only* have three gold medals on our mantles. However, these are the best of the best athletes we're talking about here. Though any color of Olympic medal is an incredible achievement, every other Summer Olympian in this top 10 had at least four first-place finishes.
6. Caeleb Dressel, Swimming
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Career Medals (7):
- 7 Gold (4x100m freestyle in 2016 and 2020; 4x100m medley in 2016 and 2020; 50m freestyle in 2020; 100m freestyle in 2020; 100m butterfly in 2020)
Without question, Caeleb Dressel is the star already in our top 10 whose ranking could change the most in the next two weeks.
Sure, both Katie Ledecky and Simone Biles could add to their legacy, but they're already in the top three with no chance of leapfrogging Michael Phelps at No. 1.
If Dressel wins three more gold medals in Paris, though, he would join Phelps (and perhaps Ledecky) as the only Olympians in double digits in that department and would have an argument for jumping all the way to No. 2 as a result.
A few months ago, that didn't seem possible.
Dressel abruptly stepped away from swimming in the summer of 2022, literally withdrawing in the middle of that summer's World Championships in Budapest after winning two golds and subsequently vanishing from the public eye for nearly two years.
But he was back in a big way at the U.S. Olympic Trials last month in Indianapolis, winning both the 50m freestyle and 100m butterfly and qualifying for the 4x100m freestyle relay.
Throw in the 4x100m medley relay in which Dressel will probably swim the butterfly leg, and there's a real chance he could hit that double-digit count in gold medals.
Even if he walks away from Paris empty-handed, though, he's already one of just nine Olympians in Team USA history with at least seven gold medals. He's also one of only two athletes from any nation to win at least five golds in a single Olympics in the past three decades—along with Phelps, who did it in each of 2004, 2008 and 2016.
Simply put, Dressel's rampage through the 2020 Games was legendary.
5. Ryan Lochte, Swimming
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Career Medals (12):
- 6 Gold (4x200m freestyle in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016; 200m backstroke in 2008; 400m medley in 2012)
- 3 Silver (200m medley in 2004 and 2012; 4x100m freestyle in 2012)
- 3 Bronze (200m medley in 2008; 400m medley in 2008; 200m backstroke in 2012)
Ryan Lochte's Olympic legacy is both intertwined with and complicated by Michael Phelps.
For all five of Lochte's relay medals, Phelps swam a better leg and somewhat carried the team to victory. (Lochte was only the "weakest" link in one of those five finals, though.)
Moreover, in four of Lochte's other five silver/bronze medals, it was Phelps who won the gold.
Twice taking first runner-up and twice taking second runner-up to Phelps is doggone impressive, though. He was either the best or second-best mortal in those events. And Lochte did finally beat Phelps to win that 400m medley gold medal in 2012, with the G.O.A.T. taking a rare fourth place in that final.
That was massive for Lochte. Scottie Pippen never won a ring without Michael Jordan, but Lochte did beat Phelps. Plus, he won a pair of backstroke medals, in which Phelps never competed.
Still, it always kind of felt like Lochte was living in Phelps' shadow. Not riding his coattails, per se, but definitely more than a little overlooked for someone who is tied for the second-most Olympic medals in Team USA history.
We might be underselling his six gold medals at just No. 5 on this list.
("Lochtegate" in 2016 was one of the biggest non-doping scandals in recent Olympic history, but we decided not to let that near international incident impact where he landed in this ranking.)
4. Allyson Felix, Track & Field
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Career Medals (11):
- 7 Gold (4x400m relay in 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020; 4x100m relay in 2012 and 2016; 200m in 2012)
- 3 Silver (200m in 2004 and 2008; 400m in 2016)
- 1 Bronze (400m in 2020)
Though swimming is where individual Olympians have been able to rack up five or more medals in a single year, track and field has historically been Team USA's primary source of hardware, resulting in 827 medals to swimming's 578.
However, track and field simply isn't conducive for individuals stockpiling medals, save for the occasional Carl Lewis, Usain Bolt...or Allyson Felix.
In Olympics history, only 18 athletes (six Americans) have won at least six medals in track and field. Only five of them (three Americans) won at least six gold medals. And save for Finland's Paavo Nurmi winning 12 total medals in the 1920s, no one can hold a candle to Felix's 11.
Team USA has 617 more medals in track and field than any other country, and Felix has more medals in track and field than any other American.
Respect.
More than half of Felix's medals and nearly all of her golds were relay races, but that's the furthest thing from an asterisk to discredit her achievements.
Now throw in the fact that to get her final two medals, she had to come back from a life-threatening pregnancy emergency in 2018 and had to wait an additional year to run at nearly 36 years old because COVID-19 postponed the 2020 Olympics to 2021.
Hollywood wouldn't even want that script for a movie because it's too unrealistic, but Felix did it.
3. Katie Ledecky, Swimming
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Career Medals (10):
- 7 Gold (800m freestyle in 2012, 2016 and 2020; 200m freestyle in 2016; 400m freestyle in 2016; 1,500m freestyle in 2020; 4x200m freestyle in 2016)
- 3 Silver (4x100m freestyle in 2016, 4x200m freestyle in 2020, 400m freestyle in 2020)
Katie Ledecky is one of 25 athletes in Olympic history with at least seven gold medals.
What sets her apart in U.S. lore, though, is how convincingly she won some of those.
For her first gold medal in 2012, then-15-year-old Ledecky won the 800m freestyle by a margin of more than four seconds.
That was merely a teaser of what was to come four years later.
In 2016, Ledecky set world records in the finals of both the 400m and 800m freestyles, winning the former by nearly five seconds and the latter by more than 11 seconds. Poor Jazmin Carlin swam quite well to take silver in both events, but never even remotely had a chance for gold in either one.
When the IOC added the women's 1,500m freestyle event for the 2020 Games, the only real question was whether Ledecky would already be out of the pool by the time the silver medalist finished.
She ended up defeating countrymate Erica Sullivan by a little over four seconds—this despite Ledecky's swimming in the final of the 200m freestyle less than 75 minutes prior to the start of the 1,500.
She'll be back in the pool in Paris with a good chance of becoming the second-most decorated U.S. Olympian of all time. There's presently a four-way tie between Jenny Thompson, Ryan Lochte, Dara Torres and Natalie Coughlin with 12, but Ledecky could get (at least) three more to ascend to No. 2.
2. Simone Biles, Gymnastics
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Career Medals (7):
- 4 Gold (Vault in 2016, Floor Exercise in 2016, Individual All-Around in 2016, Team in 2016)
- 1 Silver (Team in 2020)
- 2 Bronze (Balance Beam in 2016 and 2020)
Larger than life at just 4'8", Simone Biles is easily one of the most recognizable Olympians of all time.
The way that Biles flies through the air defies everything that Isaac Newton tried to teach us about gravity, and that's without accounting for the fact that she's simultaneously doing enough flips and twists to make you a little dizzy just by watching from the comfort of your couch.
Not one, not two, but five gymnastics moves have been named after Biles—two in vault, two in floor exercise and one on the balance beam. Needless to say, they have absurdly high difficulty ratings, though she manages to make them look effortless.
During the 2016 Olympics, she became both the first U.S. women's gymnast to earn at least four career gold medals and the first women's gymnast from any nation to win four gold medals in a single Olympics since Romania's Ecaterina Szabo in 1984.
Biles is already one of just 15 female gymnasts from any nation with at least seven career Olympic medals, tied with Shannon Miller (1992 and 1996) for most in U.S. history. And it's just about a foregone conclusion she's going to add to that medal count very soon in Paris.
There's no catching USSR's Larisa Latynina in first place with 18 medals, but getting four more this year would move Biles into a tie for second place all-time.
It's unfortunate for her medal count that "the twisties" caused Biles to withdraw from most of her scheduled events at the 2020 Olympics, but what that did for the advancement of the conversation about the role of mental health in sports also became something of a defining moment of her legacy.
It's because of the dominance and "iconicness" mentioned in the intro that Biles landed ahead of quite a few athletes with several more medals.
Her vault and floor exercise scores in 2016 were among the highest marks in gymnastics history, and her level of fame is so off the charts that Jonathan Owens—after two years as a near full-time starter at safety in the NFL—is most well-known for being Biles' husband.
It sure feels like she has more than just seven medals in her Olympic career.
1. Michael Phelps, Swimming
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Career Medals (28):
- 23 Gold (100m butterfly in 2004, 2008 and 2012; 200m butterfly in 2004, 2008 and 2016; 200m medley in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016; 400m medley in 2004 and 2008; 4x200m freestyle in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016, 4x100m medley in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016; 4x100m freestyle in 2008 and 2016; 200m freestyle in 2008)
- 3 Silver (200m butterfly in 2012; 4x100m freestyle in 2012; 100m butterfly in 2016)
- 2 Bronze (200m freestyle in 2004; 4x100m freestyle in 2004)
Not exactly a tough call for the top spot here.
At 6'4" with a wingspan on par with that of a pterodactyl—Who can forget that back slapping flap he used to do before every race?—Michael Phelps probably could have been a world class soccer goalie had he felt so inclined. Instead, he became the king of the butterfly and the world's most decorated Olympian of all time.
By a laughable margin, too.
In the span of four unforgettable summers in the pool, Phelps won as many Olympic medals (28) as the entire nation of Portugal has won in both Summer and Winter Olympics history.
If we counted Phelps as his own country, his 23 gold medals would be tied with Ethiopia for 44th most all-time, ahead of both Argentina (21) and Mexico (13); slightly behind Jamaica (26) and its fabled bobsled team.
Over the course of his career, Phelps set 39 world records (29 individual, 10 team), with seven of those occurring just at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing—where he also broke Mark Spitz's all-time record of seven gold medals in a single Olympics by securing eight of them.
For each of the 200m butterfly, 200m medley and 400m medley, Phelps broke his own world record seven times. (Each of his individual records has since been broken, but the 4x100m freestyle relay and 4x200m freestyle relay records that he was a part of in 2008 and 2009, respectively, still stand as the best ever.)
No matter how many times we bill a star swimmer as "The Next Michael Phelps," there will probably never be another Phelps.
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