Olympic Countries & Abbreviations
There are only 192 countries in the world, yet the International Olympic Committee recognizes more than 200 nations. How did that happen?
It's rather simple, really. The IOC recognizes as nations certain independent territories, commonwealths, protectorates and geographical areas. For example, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands are all United States territories, but they're considered nations by the IOC. Each has its own National Olympic Committee and is allowed to compete just as if it were a sovereign nation.
On the other hand, there are currently three countries that don't have NOCs and therefore can't participate in the Olympics: Kiribati, Marshall Islands, and the Vatican City.
In addition to the U. S. territories, the IOC recognizes Aruba (Netherlands), Bermuda (United Kingdom), British Virgin Islands (United Kingdom), Cayman Islands (United Kingdom), Cook Islands (New Zealand), Hong Kong (China), Netherlands Antilles (Netherlands), and Palestine.
That makes a total of 201 nations recognized by the IOC. Each has a unique three-letter abbreviation used during the Olympic games. The lists below show the nations organized alphabetically by abbreviation and then organized alphabetically by name of the nation. Territories recognized by the ICO are indicated by an asterisk (*).