Para Swimming

Para Swimming’s vision is to enable Para Swimmers to showcase their abilities and fulfil their full potential at all levels from the grassroots through to the high-performance level.  

Its mission is to develop a long-term competition calendar which encourages and increases athlete participation, provides high levels of professional officiating and classification, fair competition, and boosts the profile of the sport and its athletes.

Para swimming is practised internationally by athletes in nearly 100 countries and has featured in every edition of the Paralympic Games, growing into one of the biggest and most attractive sports.

At the first Rome 1960 Paralympic Games, 77 swimmers from 15 countries competed in the sport.

Para swimming is open to male and female athletes in all eligible impairment groups who compete in backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly, freestyle, medley and relay events.

Competition opportunities include the Paralympic Games every four years, biennial World Championships and biennial or quadrennial regional Championships.  

The World Series, featuring a number of swim meetings around the world, was launched in 2017 to provide greater classification opportunities and top-level competition opportunities for athletes.

To further improve the skillset of those involved in the sport, several courses are held each year to improve the standards of national and international technical officials and classifiers.

World Para Swimming uses the same rules as its Olympic counterpart, the International Swimming Federation (FINA), with some modifications where needed. Further to ongoing contacts between World Para Swimming and FINA, there is a desire to explore opportunities for synergies in areas in which both organisations share common interests.