Water Polo at the 2024 Summer Olympics

The water polo tournament at the 2024 Paris Olympics was held at two venues, with the preliminaries at the newly-built Paris Olympic Aquatic Centre, and the playoffs at the Paris La Défense Arena. These Games preserved the format of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, when the number of women’s teams was increased to 10 to achieve closer parity to the men, who had 12 squads.

Qualification was based on a nation’s position within several tournaments, including the 2023 and 2024 World Championships. Additionally, each continent was guaranteed at least one team, although South Africa, who took both the men’s and women’s spots, withdrew after Swimming South Africa noted the lack of public and financial support for sending the team. The nation was replaced by Romania and Canada, respectively, in the men’s and women’s tournaments.

The Serbian men had won the past two editions of the tournaments, and they defended their title a third time in Paris, defeating Croatia in the final. The United States won the bronze medal match against Hungary, their first podium finish since 2008. In the women’s tournament, Spain bested Australia to win the gold medal and improve on their runner-up performance from Tokyo. The women from the United States, meanwhile, who had been the dominant force in the sport and won the last three Olympic titles, were shockingly defeated in the bronze medal match by the Netherlands, and went home without a medal for the first time since the sport was added to the programme in 2000.