A third-place finish, but a historic low in golds

The Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games concluded on October 4, with equestrian events bringing the competition to a close. South Korea finished with 39 gold, 43 silver and 68 bronze medals, placing third behind China and Japan. The total fell short of the national sports body’s pre-Games target of 40 to 45 gold medals.

South Korea’s final gold came in men’s football. The team beat Japan in the final on October 3, making the title the country’s 39th and last gold medal of the Games. The tournament ended with a striking contrast: a celebrated team victory alongside the country’s smallest gold-medal haul in more than four decades.

South Korea’s 39 golds were its lowest total since the 1982 New Delhi Asian Games, when it won 28.

How South Korea’s medal momentum changed

After winning 93 gold medals and finishing second at the 1986 Seoul Games, South Korea collected at least 50 golds at each of the next eight Asian Games, through the 2014 event in Incheon. It finished second overall seven times during that stretch. Its record haul came at the 2002 Busan Games, where it won 96 gold medals.

The decline became visible at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games. South Korea won 49 golds and fell to third behind China and Japan for the first time in years. At the Hangzhou Games, held in 2023 after a pandemic-related postponement, it won 42; this time, the total slipped again to 39.

  • 2014 Incheon: South Korea continued its run of at least 50 gold medals.
  • 2018 Jakarta-Palembang: 49 golds and third place.
  • 2023 Hangzhou: 42 golds and third place.
  • 2026 Aichi-Nagoya: 39 golds and third place.

The overall ranking alone does not tell the whole story. South Korea has remained in the top three, but its gold total has fallen at each of the past two Games, while Japan has increased its lead. At Hangzhou, Japan won 52 golds to South Korea’s 42; in Aichi-Nagoya, the gap grew from 10 golds to 44.

Traditional strengths delivered fewer titles

The shortfall was especially noticeable in sports where South Korea has historically expected strong results. The national team had targeted five gold medals in archery but won three. In women’s recurve archery—the bow style in which the limbs curve away from the archer—South Korea failed to win gold for the first time in Asian Games history. Seventeen-year-old Indian archer Kumkum Anil Mohod was among the competitors who made the event particularly challenging.

Swimming also produced only one gold, amid strong competition from China and injury concerns involving Kim Woo-min, a three-time gold medalist at the previous Games. South Korea won three golds each in shooting and taekwondo, and two in badminton. In taekwondo, two golds came in poomsae, a judged sequence of set movements, while Song Da-bin was the country’s only gold medalist in sparring, the head-to-head fighting discipline.

Other established events also brought disappointment. Judo produced one gold, won by Heo Mi-mi, while track and field, sepak takraw, wushu and jiu-jitsu yielded no champions for South Korea, despite expectations of gold in those sports. The results suggest that the challenge is not simply winning fewer medals overall, but maintaining the depth and consistency that once made Korean athletes favorites in particular events.

In a medal table, a country’s position is based first on gold medals, then silver and bronze. A strong total medal count can therefore still come with a lower ranking if other countries win more golds.

Some sports met expectations, while others set records

Fencing was one of the brighter parts of the campaign. Led by Oh Sang-uk, who won two sabre titles, South Korea reached its target of four gold medals. Japan, however, won six fencing golds, preventing South Korea from claiming an overall team title in the sport for a fifth consecutive Games.

Modern pentathlon brought South Korea two golds, leaving it tied with China for the top position in that sport. Table tennis had a very different outcome: South Korea won three bronze medals but no gold or silver. For the first time since table tennis became an official Asian Games sport at the 1958 Tokyo Games, no South Korean player or team reached a final.

The number of sports in which South Korea won gold was 22, close to the 20 sports in which it won gold at Hangzhou. Team sports helped keep the total respectable: South Korea won men’s and women’s 5-on-5 basketball, men’s 3-on-3 basketball, baseball, men’s football and women’s handball. The baseball team won its fifth consecutive Asian Games title, the men’s football team its fourth, and the women’s handball team returned to the top for the first time in eight years.

South Korea also met its target of two esports gold medals. Sailing and canoeing contributed two golds apiece, and teqball—a ball sport played across a curved table—added a gold in its first appearance as an official event. These successes showed that the country could still produce champions across a broad program, even as several traditional medal sources weakened.

Japan’s gains changed the regional balance

Host nation Japan won 83 gold medals, beating its previous Asian Games record of 78, set at the 1966 Bangkok Games. Its total was 31 higher than the 52 golds it earned in Hangzhou. Japan won 10 golds in track and field, nine in judo, eight in cycling, and seven each in swimming and wrestling.

Japan also took six fencing golds, a sport in which South Korea has long been a major force. The results were attributed in part to the development of sports that Japan had focused on ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. Japanese athletes also competed at different levels of experience across events, with the report noting that some judo entrants were not the country’s top-tier team.

China remained far ahead of both rivals. It won 169 gold, 89 silver and 83 bronze medals, securing its 12th consecutive overall Asian Games title since 1982. Although that was fewer golds than China’s 201 golds at Hangzhou, its total still exceeded the combined gold-medal counts of South Korea and Japan.

China’s largest gold contributions came from swimming, with 30, followed by track and field with 17, shooting with 16, wushu with 12 and diving with 10. Uzbekistan and India each won 21 golds to place fourth and fifth, respectively, continuing their presence among the top five from the previous Games.

North Korea returned with a concentrated medal effort

North Korea made its first appearance at a Summer Asian Games hosted in Japan and finished 12th with seven gold, 13 silver and nine bronze medals. It sent 107 athletes, fewer than at the Hangzhou Games, and all seven of its gold medals came in weightlifting.

That result showed strong performance in a sport where North Korea remained highly competitive, but it also highlighted how concentrated the country’s medal success was. South Korea’s challenge was different: it won golds across 22 sports, yet several of its usual powerhouses produced fewer titles than expected. In both cases, the range of events capable of generating top results remains an important measure of long-term strength.

What the results mean ahead of Los Angeles 2028

The medal table points to a more competitive Asian sporting landscape. China continues to dominate the overall standings, Japan has built momentum across a wide range of events, and countries in Central Asia and Southeast Asia are improving. South Korea’s third-place finish therefore offers only a partial picture of its position: the shrinking gold total and the widening gap with Japan are harder to dismiss.

Kim Taek-soo, head of South Korea’s national training center, said that stronger performances from Central and Southeast Asian countries are accelerating the improvement of sport across Asia. He called for careful analysis of events where medals declined and thorough preparation for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, rather than relying on short-term results.

For South Korea, that means examining why expected titles in archery, swimming, judo and other established events did not materialize, while also identifying which newer or less dominant events can become reliable sources of medals. The football victory and successes in basketball, baseball, handball and esports show that winning teams remain possible. The larger question is whether South Korea can rebuild consistent depth across its traditional strengths as Japan and other Asian competitors continue to improve.