Sport in Germany is an important part of German culture and their society. In 2006, about 28 million people were members of the more than 87,000 sport clubs in Germany. Almost all sports clubs are represented by the German Olympic Sports Federation.
In several sports, both individual and team, Germany has good representation and many success stories. The most popular sport in Germany is football. Germany's national football team is one of the world's most successful teams with four FIFA World Cup victories (1954, 1974, 1990 and 2014) and three UEFA Euro victories (1972, 1980 and 1996). German clubs have won 32 major European trophies, making Germany the fourth most successful country in European football. Germany's top-flight club football league is named Bundesliga and is followed by millions of fans around the world.
Other popular team sports in Germany include basketball, tennis, motorsport and handball. Germany's male and female national handball teams are often featured among the world's best, while the Handball-Bundesliga is seen as one of the elite leagues of Europe. The German national basketball team's best results were gold in 1993, silver in 2005, and bronze in 2022. Germany have made seven appearances at the FIBA World Cup, winning gold in 2023, and bronze in 2002. At the Olympic Games, in Germany's seven appearances, their top performance is their fourth-place finish in 2024. The Basketball Bundesliga is widely considered one of the most competitive in Europe.
Germany has a long and successful tradition in individual sports as well. Tennis has a long history in the country with a German, Gottfried von Cramm, being the first non-American, British, Australian or French Grand Slam tournament singles winner, along with fencing, shooting and boxing. Winter sports are also widespread in Germany, and the country is a popular international skiing destination, known for its ski resorts. German skiers achieved good results in Winter Olympic Games and Alpine Ski World Cup, while German athletes won the most gold medals at the Olympics in Biathlon. Motorsports is also extremely popular in Germany with racing teams like Mercedes and Audi and race drivers like Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel.
Historically, Germany has been very successful in the Olympic Games, taking part from the first Olympiad and most Games out of 48. German athletes have won 1,419 medals at the Summer Olympic Games, and another 435 at the Winter Olympic Games, for a combined total of 1,854 medals, which makes them the second most successful nation in Olympic history for total medals. The country hosted one Winter Olympics, in 1936, and two Summer Olympics, in 1936 and 1972.
Participation by sport This list was published by German Olympic Sports Confederation in 2023.
# Sport Participants National teams Details1Football(including futsal) 7,364,775 Germany national football teamGermany women's national football teamFutsal Football in Germany2Gymnastics(including physical education) 4,785,707 3Tennis 1,475,131 Davis Cup teamFed Cup teamTennis in Germany4German Alpine Club 1,406,952 5German Shooting and Archery Federation 1,319,794 6German Athletics Association(including road running) 775,733 Athletics in Germany7German Handball Association 736,736 Germany men's national handball teamGermany women's national handball teamHandball in Germany8Golf 682,942 9German Equestrian Federation 663,145 10German Life Saving Association 578,834
History
Friedrich Ludwig Jahn known as Turnvater Jahn (father of gymnastics) was born in 1778 and worked as an assistant teacher in Berlin. At Berlin's Hasenheide Friedrich Ludwig Jahn opened the first German gymnastics field ('Turnplatz'), or open-air gymnasium, in spring 1811. His activities were particularly pointed at the youth, with whom he went to the gym field in free afternoons. The German gymnastics, understood by Jahn as a whole of the physical exercises.
Jahn developed well-known gymnastic equipment, invented also new apparatuses. Jahn invented the parallel bars, rings, high bar, the pommel horse and the vault horse. Particularly by his main writing "Die Deutsche Turnkunst" (1816) the apparatus gymnastics developed to an independent kind of sport, and so the gym activities were not only limited to simple physical exercises, which he quoted as following: "Going, running, jumping, throwing, carrying are free exercises, everywhere applicable, as free as fresh air."
Jahn's Turners movement, first realized at Volkspark Hasenheide in Berlin in 1811, was the origin of the modern sports clubs.
With the national gymnastics festivals in Coburg in 1860, in Berlin in 1861 and in Leipzig in 1863, the memory of Jahn's ideas returned into the people's consciousness. The inscription at the gable of his house "Frisch, Fromm, Fröhlich, Frei", translated as 'fresh, pious, cheerful, free", which originated in Jahn's time, became the basic idea of the German gymnastics movement.
In 1934, the Nazi government founded the Deutscher Reichsbund für Leibesübungen, later the Nationalsozialistischer Reichsbund für Leibesübungen, as the official sports governing body of the Third Reich. All other German sport associations gradually lost their freedom and were coopted into it. The organization was disbanded in 1945 by the American military government.
Olympics
In the all-time Olympic Games medal count through 2022 Germany ranks fourth, East Germany fifteenth and West Germany twenty-third. If all the medals are combined Germany ranks second. If only winter olympic medals count, from all German states (East, West, united team and united Germany), it is the nation with the most medals.
Germany has hosted the Summer Olympic Games twice, in Berlin in 1936 and in Munich in 1972. Germany hosted the Winter Olympic Games in 1936 when they were staged in the Bavarian twin towns of Garmisch and Partenkirchen.
Germany claimed the most, if not, gold medals and the most total medals during the 1992, 1998, 2002 and 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin. East Germany claimed the most gold medals at 1984 Winter Olympics.
Main sports Team sports Association football
Association football is the most popular sport in Germany. With a total of 26,000 clubs and 178,000 teams, German football is financed by means of state funding and state contributions, voluntary service, private sponsors and membership fees.
The Dresden English Football Club is considered the first modern football club in Germany and probably the first in continental Europe. Germany's top flight in football is the Bundesliga, which has the highest average attendances of any soccer league in the world; among all professional sports leagues, its average attendance is second only to American football's NFL. German clubs have won 32 major European trophies, making Germany the fourth most successful country in European football. As of the 2023–24 season, the Bundesliga is placed fourth in UEFA rankings, which are based on the performance of clubs in the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Europa League.
Like in most European countries, football in Germany is the number one attended and practised sport. Besides the national league system, the FIFA World Cup and UEFA European Championship have much attention among its population.
FC Bayern Munich (German: FC Bayern München) is the most successful German football club, with 30 national championships, 20 DFB-Pokals, and 6 European championships (three European Cups and three Champions Leagues) to its credit, as well as one UEFA Cup, one European Cup Winners' Cup, two UEFA Super Cups, two FIFA Club World Cups and two Intercontinental Cups, making it one of the most successful European clubs internationally.
The Germany national soccer team is one of the traditional powers of international football. It won the FIFA World Cup in 1954, 1974, 1990 and 2014, being the joint-second most successful nation in the tournament only surpassed by Brazil, and the UEFA European Championship in 1972 and 1980 as West Germany hosted the UEFA Euro 1988 and in 1996 as Germany, a record (tied with Spain). The country will also host the upcoming UEFA Euro 2024. They also won the FIFA Confederations Cup in 2017. Miroslav Klose is the leading goal scorer for the national team with 71 goals and in the world cup with 16, but his fame is eclipsed by that of Franz Beckenbauer who is one of the few men in the world who have won the World Cup both as a coach and a player. Other famous German players include Fritz Walter, Gerd Müller, Rudi Völler, Jürgen Klinsmann, Oliver Kahn, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Philipp Lahm, Manuel Neuer and Thomas Müller. Germany also hosted the World Cup in 1974, which they won, and 2006, finishing third in 2006 after losing a close semi-final contest to eventual winners Italy. East Germany won gold at the 1976 Summer Olympics.
The women's national team is also a world power, with its wins of the FIFA Women's World Cup in 2003 and 2007 and a record eight UEFA European Women's Championships (1989, 1991, 1995, 1997, 2001, 2005, 2009, 2013), as well as a gold medal in the Summer Olympics in 2016. They also hosted the 1989, 1995 and 2001 UEFA European Women's Championship, and the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup.
Germany is the only nation to win both the men's and women's competitions in the World Cups, European titles and Olympic Games gold.Germany set the record straight. FIFA. Retrieved 21 June 2015. No country has more combined men's and women's World Cup championships, and only the United States has won more combined men's and women's regional/continental championships (United States 12 in CONCACAF, Germany 11 in UEFA).
Handball
Germany together with Denmark is regarded as the birthplace of handball. The first match of the modern era was officially recorded on 29 October 1917 in Berlin, Germany. Carl Schelenz is credited developing most rules of modern handball. Outdoor Handball had its only Olympic Games appearance in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. The first international match recorded was played on 3 September 1925 between Germany and Austria.
Handball is widely regarded to be the second most popular team sport in Germany and when a study conducted by Repucom asked people which sport besides football they preferred a total of 33% voted handball, while basketball came in second with 25% of the votes, ice hockey got 24%, and volleyball got 11%. It is also the second-most played team sport in Germany with approximately 750,000 active registered players around the country as of 2016.
The German men's national team have won the IHF World Men's Handball Championship three times, the very first world cup in 1938, the West Germany team won it in 1978 and the united German team won it at home in 2007. They also have been crowned European champions twice first in 2004 and then in the 2016 rendition of the tournament. In the Olympic Games their efforts have resulted in one gold medal (1936), two silver medals (1984 and 2004) and one Bronze medal (2016).
The German Handball Bundesliga is considered to be the most competitive professional league in the world and several teams have won the EHF Champions League. A total of 19 times have a team from Germany won the Champions League as of 2017 which is the most out of any nation. The most successful team in Germany is by far THW Kiel which have won 23 German titles as well as 4 Champions League titles. They are the only team in German sport history to have managed to go a whole season without losing any points, this feat was achieved during the 2011–2012 season. Traditionally the teams in the league have been situated in smaller cities where the competition from football have not been so tough (Kiel and Flensburg for example), but during the 21st century more teams from larger cities have emerged such as HSV Hamburg, TSV Hannover-Burgdorf, TVB Stuttgart, SC DHfK Leipzig and Füchse Berlin. Uwe Gensheimer is a popular German handball player.