Ticket sellers are predicting that the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games may be the toughest Olympic ticket to score in decades, especially in U.S. markets.
When tickets went on sale in June, July, and October last year in the U.S. via CoSport, tickets sold out within about three hours of their release. A new batch of tickets were available this past Thursday and the demand proved to be high once again. Almost every event sold-out again with the exception of athletics, basketball, boxing, and volleyball.
Michael Clyne, spokesman for CoSport, the official ticket seller for the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee, told the Wall Street Journal that most of their Tokyo 2020 single tickets sold out in the U.S. market ahead of Thursday’s release.
“I can confirm not only that the Tokyo 2020 ticket lottery registered the highest numbers to date, but that it was 54% higher than London’s numbers,” Clyne told WSJ.
Japan residents have also proved their interest, as Tokyo 2020 already sold 4.48 million Olympic tickets to fans in the host country – more than half of the 7.8 million tickets the organizing committee estimates will be available for sale. A spokesman for Japan’s organizing committee told WSJ that while it couldn’t say at this stage what percentage Tokyo’s ticket allotment will be, roughly 2.3 million tickets will likely be sold to the 200+ countries that participate in the Olympics.
During previous ticket lotteries in Japan, more than 56 million requests were made for tickets, but only 3 million were sold. At the time, a Tokyo spokesman told The Associated Press that “the demand from the general public indeed exceeded our expectations” and organizers were “absolutely pleased” by the interest. While Olympics in Russia, South Korea, and Brazil showed less interest from customers, the Tokyo Games are incredibly in-demand, with even scarcer tickets for the popular 2012 London Olympics.
In the spring, overseas residents will be able to buy tickets through the Tokyo 2020 website, although a spokesman told the WSJ that it’s not clear how many tickets will be actually left at that time.
The Olympic Games are slated to take place from July 24 to August 9, followed by the Paralympic Games from August 25 to September 6. Ticket prices and venues were announced back in 2018, as well as a ban on ticket scalping early last year.