Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnastics Programs

Note: I am using a mathematical ranking system to rank national programs that gives zero weight to team medals. This isn’t so much a measure of what programs have had the most success in the team competition, but have had the most success in producing star gymnasts/winning medals in individual events.

To explain how the points system works: Only individual medals from the World Championships and Olympics are counted. A gold is worth three points, silver is worth two points, and bronze is worth one point. If there is a tie, both gymnasts get the full point total, even in cases where gymnasts from the same nation shared a medal. There is also one technical issue I want to clear up. The following gymnasts have multiple nationalities:

Oksana Chusovitina: (Soviet Union, Germany, and Uzbekistan)
Annia Hatch: (Cuba and United States)
Tatiana Lysenko: (Soviet Union and Ukraine)

I awarded each gymnast their full medal total and that full medal total to each country. This means Cuba gets points for the medal Annia Hatch won while competing for the United States. In the case of Ukraine, the United States, and the Soviet Union, this impacted their point totals, but didn’t change their ranking.

In the case of Cuba, Germany, and Uzbekistan, these extra points did help them pass other nations. So these three nations are in the data twice. One with the full point totals of all their gymnasts, one where they are “adjusted” having medals won by a gymnast while she represented another country removed. Other rankings can be found in the Data Hub. The results are below.

NationPoints
Soviet Union401
United States351
Romania288
Russia170
China163
Czechoslovakia90
East Germany84
Hungary45
Brazil37
Japan35
Ukraine34
Germany29
United Kingdom24
Uzbekistan20
Italy19
Poland17
North Korea16
Germany (Adjusted)14
Belgium11
Canada11
Algeria10
Netherlands10
Sweden10
France9
Uzbekistan (Adjusted)9
Australia8
Bulgaria6
Austria6
Belarus6
Spain5
Switzerland4
Cuba3
South Korea2
Yugoslavia2
Cuba (Adjusted)1
Mexico1
Vietnam1
Last Update: 2025 World Championships

Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of All Time
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 2010s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant American Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant American Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Russian Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Romanian Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Chinese Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Soviet Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Ukrainian Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Japanese Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Hungarian Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant East German Gymnasts
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Czechoslovakian Gymnasts

Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 2010s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 2000s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1990s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1980s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1970s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1960s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1950s
Link to: Ranking the Most Dominant Gymnasts of the 1930s
Link to: Which Countries Have Produced the Most Medalists?

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