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I am curious about the countries that have won the fewest medals at the Olympics - or are there countries that never won any kind of medal at the Olympics?

To keep the list a sensible size, let's ignore countries with populations below 5 million like Monaco.

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So you're looking for countries that:

  • have never won a Summer or Winter Olympic medal
  • have a population of at least 5 million

As of the end of the 2020 Summer Olympics, there are 24 such countries in existence, and for the sake of completion, here they all are:

Country Population1 Summer Olympics Winter Olympics
Angola 25 million 10 0
Bangladesh 161 million 10 0
Benin 11.5 million 12 0
Bolivia 11.4 million 15 6
Cambodia 15.3 million 10 0
Chad 13.7 million 13 0
Democratic Republic of the Congo 91.9 million 11 0
El Salvador 6.4 million 12 0
Guinea 12.4 million 12 0
Honduras 9.6 million 12 1
Laos 7.1 million 10 0
Libya ~7 million 12 0
Madagascar 26.3 million 13 2
Malawi 18.1 million 11 0
Mali 19.3 million 14 0
Myanmar 53.6 million 18 0
Nicaragua 6.2 million 13 0
Papua New Guinea 8.6 million 11 0
Republic of the Congo 5.2 million 13 0
Rwanda2 11.3 million 10 0
Sierra Leone 7.1 million 12 0
Somalia 11 million 10 0
South Sudan 11 million 2 0
Yemen 28.5 million 8 0

1As of December 2019
2Rwanda have won a Paralympic medal

A few points that stand out:

  • Bolivia has appeared at the most Olympics (21) and the most Winter Olympics (6) of any country on the list.
  • Myanmar has appeared at the most Summer Olympics (18) of any country on the list.
  • Bangladesh has the highest population of any country on the list.
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  • This summer, Burkina Faso, Turkmenistan and San Marino all won their first medals ever. Of course, San Marino doesn't qualify due to their population (~34000). Don't know about the other pop's.
    – CGCampbell
    Aug 10, 2021 at 12:11
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    Burkina Faso and Turkmenistan did qualify, and were in the earlier version of the table, but were removed when I updated it following Tokyo 2020.
    – F1Krazy
    Aug 10, 2021 at 12:22
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According to this Wikipedia entry - as of the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, there are 71 (of 201) countries, that are/were part of the Olympic movement, that are yet to achieve a medal at any Olympic Games; Summer or Winter.

The worst performing country (with over 5m population) appears to be Bolivia.

Bolivia have competed at 20 Olympic Games (14 Summer, 6 Winter), have sent 78 competitors (63 Summer, 15 Winter), but are yet to register a medal position.

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