One of Los Angeles’ historic and most storied sports venues and one of the city’s newest will share the Olympics ceremony stage in 2028.
Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in Exposition Park and SoFi Stadium in Inglewood will host the Opening and Closing Ceremony for the 2028 Olympics, it was announced Thursday.
The Opening Ceremony on July 14, 2028, will be shared by both the Coliseum and SoFi Stadium. The Closing Ceremony is set for July 30, 2028, at the LA Memorial Coliseum, which will become the first venue in history to host events for three Olympics.
LA Memorial Coliseum previously provided the stage for Olympics events in 1932 and 1984.
“The venues selected for the 2028 Opening and Closing Ceremonies will highlight Los Angeles’s rich sporting history and cutting-edge future, showcasing the very best that LA has to offer on the world stage,” said LA28 Chairperson and President Casey Wasserman. “These two extraordinary venues will create an unforgettable experience, welcoming fans from across the globe to an Olympic and Paralympic Games like never before and concluding what will go down as one of the most incredible Games in history.”
The Paralympic Opening Ceremony on Aug. 15, 2028 will be at SoFi Stadium, home of the Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers. The Closing Ceremony on Aug. 27 will be at the Coliseum.
As for competition venues, the plan for the 2028 Olympics became clearer last month when locations for more than a dozen sports, including beach volleyball, surfing and baseball, were revealed. LA28 presented its updated list of 2028 Olympics venues to the International Olympic Committee, which signed off last month on the updated plan.
Venues for more sports were announced earlier, including LA Memorial Coliseum, the Sepulveda Basin Recreation Area, BMO Stadium in Exposition Park, the Los Angeles Convention Center and Crypto.com Arena in downtown LA, the sports complex in Carson, Rose Bowl in Pasadena and several sites outside the city of Los Angeles, including canoe slalom and softball, which are set for Oklahoma City.
The medal events program for 2028 features six new mixed gender team events in what the LA28 organizing committee called a “monumental step forward.” The program approved for 2028 has 22 more medal events than Paris 2024 at 351.
Mixed team events added for 2028 include artistic gymnastics, athletics (4×100 mixed gender relay), golf, archery (compound bow), coastal rowing beach sprint and table tennis. The competition format for the new artistic gymnastic mixed team event will be finalized and announced at a later date.
The medal competition includes expansions to the field of women’s soccer and water polo event, a new women’s boxing weight class, an expanded 3×3 basketball field, and more medal events in swimming and sport climbing.
Flag football will make its Olympic debut in 2028 and lacrosse will return to the lineup of medal sports for the first time in more than a century. Baseball and softball will make their Olympic comeback, and cricket also will be part of the lineup.
