Do Olympic athletes pay taxes on their medals?

Alysa Liu soared on ice. The U.S. women’s hockey team fought its way back to the top of the podium. Jordan Stolz dominated the speed skating circuit. And Mikaela Shiffrin once again rewrote the record books on skis.

But as Team USA returns home with an impressive haul of hardware, will they owe taxes on their medals?

Generally, no. Medals and associated bonuses are federally tax-free. However, state taxes and other earnings can complicate the picture.

For years, U.S. athletes faced IRS rules that soured the sweetness of Olympic medal wins. Before the 2016 Games, the IRS considered prizes and awards won in Olympic competition as taxable income. That meant an Olympic medal’s fair market value, plus any cash bonus awarded with it, could be taxed as wages.

Then in 2016, Congress passed the United States Appreciation for Olympians and Paralympians Act. The law created a federal income tax exclusion for the fair market value of Olympic medals and cash prize money awarded by the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC).

That exclusion now gives many U.S. Olympic medal winners a tax break. As long as an athlete’s adjusted gross income (AGI) is below $1 million (or $500,000 if married filing separately), they get to exclude their medal(s) and any associated bonuses from their federal taxable income.

Without a doubt, Olympic medals carry significant prestige. However, their raw metal value is fairly modest.

Gold medals are mostly silver with a layer of gold plating, making their “street value” in the low thousands of dollars, depending on current commodity prices. A bronze? That comes in at under $100.

A medal’s real monetary value comes from the USOPC’s Operation Gold Award, a financial prize for each medal level. For the 2026 Winter Games, those awards total $37,500 for gold, $22,500 for silver, and $15,000 for bronze.

Athletes who win a medal as part of a team still take home the full award.

Read more: Thinking of buying gold? Here’s what investors say to watch for.

The federal tax exclusion for Olympic winnings isn’t unlimited, and it doesn’t apply to every possible Olympic-associated stream of income an athlete could earn.

Athletes who come home and go on to earn more than the $1 million AGI cap aren’t eligible for the medal and bonus exclusion. This mostly affects select athletes who go on to capture lucrative earning opportunities such as endorsement deals, book contracts, and speaking engagements. Think Michael Phelps pictured on a Wheaties box or Simone Biles’s memoir.

For Olympic medal winners, federal tax law doesn’t tell the whole story.

Many states set their own income tax rates, and not all states automatically extend the same grace to Olympic athletes as the 2016 federal tax legislation did.

Live in an income tax-free state? No problem. Yet many athletes relocate for training opportunities to states with income taxes, meaning they could still face a tax bill on their Olympic winnings.

California is the most notable in this instance, as it requires athletes living there to report Olympic winnings on their state income taxes. On the other hand, Colorado tax law specifically excludes Olympic winnings from taxable income.

In short, where an athlete trains and lives can affect the total tax on Olympic winnings.

The economics of becoming an Olympian have brought about some interesting changes to athletes’ financial security.

For most medal winners, federal tax breaks are modest, one-time events. A new program, called the Stevens Financial Security Awards, seeks to change that.

Funded by a $100 million gift from financier Ross Stevens to the USOPC, the program establishes some post-Olympic financial benefits for U.S. athletes. Starting with the current Olympics, each Olympian and Paralympian becomes eligible for up to $200,000 per Games through at least the 2032 Games, divided equally into a retirement benefit and a death benefit. There’s also a multiplier, meaning that an athlete competing in two Games would receive double the benefits.

While it’s not a tax break, it’s a new step to support U.S. Olympic athletes throughout their lives, not just during their competitive years. It also provides financial benefits to those who miss the podium but still rank among the world’s elite athletes.