Mark your calendar now: the Milano-Cortina Games run from 6 to 22 February 2026, with preliminary ski-jump qualifying starting 4 February in the early-evening slot (20:30 CET). Book accommodation within 30 km of either Milano Centrale or Cortina d'Ampezzo before 30 June 2025; prices jump roughly 40 % after that date, and the new Frecciarossa train link will cut the city-to-slopes transfer to 2 h 15 min.
Milano hosts ice events at the San Siro complex and the new 12 000-seat Milano Ice Park, while Cortina supplies the alpine thrills on the legendary Olympia delle Tofane piste. Val di Fiemme reprises its 1991 Nordic role, and Valtellina Bormio returns for men downhill after a 15-year hiatus. Buy the €19 "Trenord Pass" on event days; it bundles regional trains, city metros and the shuttle to every mountain venue.
First-timers on the programme: women Nordic combined (HS 106 / 5 km), mixed-gender skeleton team event (two runs each, total time decides), ski-mountaineering sprint and relay (adopted after 1,2 million TikTok views of the 2023 youth demo), plus the fast-track short-track mixed relay that swaps skaters mid-lap. Expect 116 medal sets across 16 sports–eight more than Beijing 2022.
Stream every second live on Discovery+ across Europe; monthly rate freezes at €6,99 if you pre-subscribe before 1 January 2026. North Americans grab the Peacock Premium bundle–$5,99 with ads, 4 K HDR on the NBC app. Turn on the "Enhanced Multiview" toggle to pick four camera angles at once; latency drops below 3 s on fibre. If you travel, activate a reputable VPN set to your home country, keep the kill-switch on, and download the official Olympics app for real-time push results without roaming data.
Milan-Cortina 2026 Calendar & Venue Map
Block 6–22 February 2026 in your diary now; the 17-day programme starts with the Opening Ceremony at San Siro at 20:00 CET and ends with the Closing party at the Verona Arena, so book trains and hotels for those exact nights first.
Competition snow events run 8–21 February, with women downhill at Val Gardena opening the Alpine calendar at 11:30 and men giant slalom on Gran Risa, Alta Badia closing it at 14:00. Nordic combined, ski jumping and cross-country cluster around Tesero Lago di Tesero stadium every day from 9 February; morning sessions start 09:30, finals 15:00. The sliding centre at Cortina Eugenio Monti track hosts bobsleigh, skeleton and luge heats from 13 February, with four-man bobsleigh finals scheduled 21 Feb at 14:30. Curling preliminaries begin 7 Feb at the Cortina Olympic Arena, the same rink used in 1956, and medal games play 20 Feb at 19:00.
Ice sports occupy two hubs: Milan new Palazzo del Ghiaccio in the Portello district seats 12,000 for short-track and figure skating, while the refurbished PalaItalia Santa Giulia hosts speed-skating on a 400m outdoor oval. Both arenas sit on Metro line M5, so you can reach either in 18 min from Duomo. Hockey preliminary rounds split between Verona Bentegodi ice stadium and Milan Forum di Assago; quarter-finals shift to Assago, semi-finals and medal games move to Bolzano PalaOnda to spotlight South-Tyrol fan culture. Sledge hockey, making its second Paralympic appearance, plays all matches in Pordenone PalaVerde 7–14 March.
Freestyle and snowboard share Livigno Mottolino and Carosello parks; halfpipe finals start 12 Feb at 13:00, big-air finals under floodlights 14 Feb at 19:00. Buy the €26 Livigno SnowPass for unlimited shuttle buses between venues and priority lift access–order online before 31 December 2025 to skip on-site queues. Ski mountaineering debuts with sprint 10 Feb at Venosc, Valtournenche and mixed relay 14 Feb; vertical race 12 Feb starts at 07:00 to avoid afternoon thaw, so reach the village the night before–parking opens 05:30 and fills quickly.
Download the free Milano Cortina 2026 app for an interactive venue map: tap any pictogram to see real-time train times, local shuttle routes and estimated walk from station to gate. For example, Milan Centrale → Tirano → shuttle to Bormio takes 2 h 40 min; the app refreshes delays every 30 s. If you plan to chase multiple events in one day, target the "Veneto triangle": after a morning biathlon in Anterselva you can reach Cortina by 12:00 via the SS49 for women’ ski-cross, then hop on the Cortina-Dobbiaco train to catch ice-climbing exhibitions at Lago di Braies by 16:00.
Tickets go on sale 12 February 2025 at 10:00 CET on the official site; expect €35–€150 for preliminary sessions, €90–€350 for finals. Bundle packs covering one sport at every venue save roughly 18% compared with single-session purchases. Accessibility seats occupy the first five rows at every venue; request them during checkout, then email [email protected] with your booking number to reserve a complimentary companion seat.
Exact competition start and end dates for every sport
Circle 4 February 2026 on your calendar: women ski-mountaineering kicks off at 09:00 in the morning in the Cinque Torri area and the first medal is awarded before 11:00. That same afternoon at 14:00 the men slopestyle snowboard qualifier drops into the Mottolino snow-park, so you can switch your stream from Cortina to Bormio without missing a gate. Curling begins two days earlier, on 2 February at 14:05 in the Milan Esposizione hall, and plays daily until the women final on 14 February at 20:00; men gold is decided 24 hours later at the same time.
Alpine skiing runs from 6 February (women super-G) through 15 February (men slalom second run), with only 8 February off to reset the slopes. Biathlon starts 7 February at 11:30 with the mixed relay in Antholz, ends 17 February at 14:30 with the men mass-start, and squeezes ten medal events into those eight race days. Ice-hockey preliminaries open 5 February at 12:00 in the revamped Forum di Milano, the women final is 20 February at 14:00, and the men final closes the Games on 22 February at 20:00. Nordics follow a tight loop: ski-jumping 8–14 February, Nordic combined 9–17 February, cross-country 7–18 February, with at least one medal every day except 11 February.
Quick-scan list (all times CET, medal events in bold):
- Bobsleigh: 9 Feb – 15 Feb
- Figure skating: 5 Feb – 15 Feb (pairs short opens, women free closes)
- Freestyle skiing: 5 Feb – 18 Feb
- Luge: 6 Feb – 12 Feb
- Short-track: 7 Feb – 16 Feb
- Skeleton: 10 Feb – 14 Feb
- Ski-mountaineering (new): 4 Feb – 7 Feb
- Speed-skating: 7 Feb – 20 Feb
Set alerts for the overlap windows–14 February hosts six medal finals in three venues–so you can pick the feed that matters most to you.
How to shuttle between Milan, Cortina, Valtellina and Anterselva in under two hours
Book the 06:35 Trenitalia AV from Milano Centrale to Verona Porta Nuova (59 min), then switch to the 07:40 SAD FlixBus direct to Cortina d’Ampezzo; you’ll step off at 09:05, giving you 55 min spare before the first Nordic combined training block.
From Cortina to Valtellina, catch the 09:30 Cortina Express that uses the Great Dolomites Road bus-only lane; it reaches Bormio at 11:02. Flash your Olympic accreditation at the driver and the ride is free–no ticket queue.
Need Anterselva instead? At Fortezze (10:42) the same coach meets a waiting Südtirol Mobil minibus; it cuts across the Stalle Pass and drops you at the Biathlon Stadium by 11:15. Total time from Cortina: 1 h 45 min.
Rental cars move faster. Take the A4 to A22 route, exit at Bressanone, follow SS49 to Val Pusteria, then SS621 to Anterselva. With light Sunday traffic the 215 km eat 1 h 58 min; winter tyres are compulsory and the Varco d’Anterselva checkpoint lets accredited vehicles skip the queue.
Helicopter? Elisystem runs a five-seat AW109 from Milan Linate to Cortina heliport in 42 min; connect to a Valtellina hop (18 min) and on to Anterselva (14 min). Book before 15 January 2026 and the 30 % Games discount knocks the €3 200 fare down to €2 240.
Buy the €29 "4-Zone Pass" on the Cortina 2026 app; it bundles trains, buses and cable cars across Veneto, Lombardy and South Tyrol for 24 h. Activate it just before boarding and every connection above counts as one ticket–no extra tap needed.
Ticket release rounds: on-sale windows, resale rules and price caps
Set three alarms: the first Milan-Cortina 2026 ticket window opens 12 February 2025 at 14:00 CET on the official site only. Demand-based batches drop every Tuesday at the same hour until 30 September or until the batch is gone, whichever hits first.
Each account may buy eight sessions total, max four per session. Prices sit in five colour-coded tiers: white (€35-55), blue (€60-90), red (€110-180), black (€220-380) and gold (€450-850). The organising committee caps every seat; resellers who push past the 20 % markup face cancelled barcodes and a €1,000 fine.
Paralympic tickets go on sale 15 April 2025 with the same weekly cadence, but the ceiling is six sessions and the top price stops at €120. Family bundles (two adults plus two under-16s) knock 25 % off the individual total if bought in the same transaction.
Resale opens 1 May 2025 through the single exchange linked to your ticket wallet. List at face value or below; the platform adds a 5 % service fee paid by the buyer. Seats transfer within 15 minutes and the original barcode dies instantly, so screenshots on WhatsApp won’t work at the gate.
Hospitality packages bypass the eight-session limit but cost 2.7× the public tier. If you only want the Opening Ceremony, enter the lottery between 20-27 February 2025; winners pay €120-650 and may collect their wristbands only in Milan or Cortina d’Ampezzo with ID.
Last-minute window starts 15 December 2025 at 09:00 CET and runs until stock is gone. Inventory comes from sponsor returns and production holds, so expect curling prelims at €25 and Alpine combined at €150. No resale is allowed from this batch.
Print-at-home tickets disappear after 1 March 2026; every seat lives in the app. Activate the NFC pass 48 h before your event, keep the phone above 30 % battery, and turn on airplane mode once the gate flashes green–this locks the code and speeds the queue behind you.
Mobile app that pushes gate changes and weather delays in real time
Download the Milano Cortina 2026 Official App from the App Store or Google Play before you pack your gloves; it pings your phone within 60 seconds of any gate flip, bus reroute, or FIS weather hold. The push uses the same data feed the organizers send to NBC, Eurosport, and RAI, so you’re not waiting for a commentator to catch up.
Once installed, open Settings → Notifications and toggle on Venue Transport and Competition Alerts. Pick the sports you actually bought tickets for; the app lets you mute anything else. If you’re skiing between Sexten and San Pellegrino Pass, switch on Mountain Road Closures and you’ll get the Italian traffic-police updates 15 minutes before they hit radio.
The forecast feed pulls from ARPA Lombardia and Meteo Trentino radars every five minutes. You’ll see a red banner if wind chill drops below –18 °C (the organizers’ threshold for spectator terraces) and a yellow one for gusts over 14 m/s that stop ski-jumpers. Tap the banner and it maps the nearest indoor shelter or heated bus stop; last February test event saved fans an average 11-minute trudge.
Buy tickets inside the app and it auto-adds a QR code to your wallet. If the start hut moves from Bormio to Santa Caterina because of fog, the code refreshes, so stewards scan the same seat for the new location. No need to queue at the box office; refunds hit your original card within three working days if the session is cancelled outright.
Offline mode caches the day transport layer. When the 4G towers in Val di Fiemme choke under 30 000 spectators, the little blue dot still shows your bus stop and walking route. Pro tip: screenshot the timetable before you ride the gondola; phone batteries drain fast at –10 °C and the app dark theme cuts power use by 18 %.
Android users can long-press the app icon and drop a widget on the lock screen; iPhone owners get Live Activities on iOS 17. Both show a countdown to the next medal event plus any active delay. Set it once and you’ll glance less, ski more.
New Sports, Stream Sources & VPN Work-arounds
Queue the 2026 Games on SRF 2, Rai 3, ORF 1 or NRK1 for free, native-language coverage; each feed geoblocks outside its home country, so set your VPN to Zurich, Milan, Vienna or Oslo respectively. NordVPN obfuscated servers still slip past Rai new IPv6 blacklist, while Surfshark rotating Italian IP stays ahead of Mediaset 12-hour ban cycle–both average 4 Mb/s more than Express during peak downhill runs.
Switching servers lets you cherry-pick commentary quirks: ORF alpine analyst Markus Kranzelbinder calls split-times 1–2 seconds faster than the world feed, NRK adds biometric sled cams for skeleton, and SRF overlays real-time wind vectors on ski-jump overlays. If you only need English, BBC iPlayer streams every British medal attempt live; pair it with a London Docklands node and you’ll keep 1080p50 without the 720p downgrade the U.S. Discovery+ app forces on European IPs.
| Platform | Home Nation | VPN Exit | Codec | Data/hr |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SRF 2 | CH | Zurich | H.264 1080p50 | 2.8 GB |
| Rai 3 | IT | Milan | H.265 720p25 | 1.5 GB |
| ORF 1 | AT | Vienna | H.264 1080p50 | 3.1 GB |
| NRK1 | NO | Oslo | H.265 1080p50 | 2.2 GB |
New on snow: ski-mountaineering races straight up and down Cortina Forcella Staunies, mixed-gender dual moguls replace the old solo format, and women Nordic combined finally debuts with a 2×5 km relay after the K-90 hill. On ice, the mass-start speed-skating finals shrink to 10 laps so the entire bracket fits inside a 45-minute TV window–perfect for catching both semis and finals during a single lunch break stream.
Ski-mountaineering race formats and medal count
Set three alarms on 8 Feb 2026: the women sprint starts at 08:30, the men at 09:05 and the mixed relay at 14:00–three medal sets decided in one day on the 1.8 km course above Cortina Tofana station. Each athlete carries 2.3 kg of mandatory gear, skins 600 m vertical and transitions twice; the relay adds a hand-slap zone where teams risk a 30-second penalty if they miss the 1 m box. Expect Italy Robert Antonioli to attack the first climb at 18 % grade; he averaged 1 040 vertical metres per hour in last season World Cup, 4 % faster than Norway Erik Hauken who took silver at the 2025 test event.
Organisers have trimmed the vertical to fit live TV windows: sprint qualification covers 80 m, semifinals 100 m and finals 120 m, all broadcast in a 45-minute block on Eurosport 4K and Discovery+. Download the Olympics app before landing in Milan; it pushes real-time split data and lets you switch to helmet-cam feeds with 8-second delay. If you’re on site, ride the Freccia nel Cielo cable car at 07:00 to reach the summit grandstand–tickets are 35 € and include a breakfast polenta station open until the first starter leaves the gate.
Three countries will leave the Dolomites with medals, but six more have realistic chances. France secured four of the last five world titles yet travels without 2023 champion Axelle Gachet-Mollaret who is on maternity leave, so 21-year-old Célia Perillat-Pessey steps up; she beat Sweden Tove Alexandersson by 11 seconds in the 2025 Engadin relay. Switzerland brings twins Marianne and Marguerite Moret who share skis waxed by the same technician who tunes Marco Odermatt downhill boards; their relay split averages 13:42, 17 s faster than the Italian pairing of Alba De Silvestro and Michele Boscacci. Medal count prediction: France 2, Italy 1, Switzerland 1, Norway 1.
Want a closer look at how elite athletes reshape their bodies for this power-to-weight discipline? Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz added 6 lb of lean mass while dropping 2 % body fat after adopting ski-mo intervals during off-season; he told reporters the switch boosted his VO2 max to 72 ml kg⁻¹ min⁻¹, numbers he credits for sharper base-running bursts. Read the full story here: https://librea.one/articles/reds-elly-de-la-cruz-reveals-body-transformation-for-2026.html. Use his 4×4-minute uphill tempo sessions on a 12 % grade–4 min on, 3 min off, four repeats, twice a week–to feel the burn the pros live with every winter.
Q&A:
When exactly do the Milano-Cortina Games start and finish, and how many competition days are there?
The 25th Winter Olympics open on 6 February 2026 with the ceremony at San Siro Stadium in Milan and close on 22 February in the Verona Arena. Between those two Fridays athletes will compete on 16 full days, because the 8th and 9th are reserved for training and maintenance only.
I’ve heard the venues are spread out. Which towns are hosting what, and how long does it take to travel between them?
Ice events are in Milan hockey at the new Forum and curling at the Allianz Cloud while the sliding track and most snow sports are in the Dolomites. Cortina d’Ampezzo has the alpine speed races, Bormio the technical events, Livigno the freestyle and snowboard finals, and Antholz the biathlon. A high-speed train gets you from Milan to Verona in 1 h 15 min; from Verona to Cortina by chartered bus or car is roughly 2 h 30 min through the Brenner pass. Organizers will run fan shuttles every 20 min on race days.
Are the Games really carbon-neutral, and what happens to the tracks afterward?
Organizers budget 1.5 million t CO₂e, but 65 % of that is erased by permanent forestry projects in Lombardy and Veneto. The Milan hockey arena is modular: 80 % of its steel will be unscrewed and reused for smaller sports halls across Italy after 2026. The Cortina sliding track already exists and will get only a new refrigeration plant; it stays for junior competitions. All temporary stands are rented, and timber from the freestyle courses is signed over to local sawmills for furniture production.
When exactly do the Milano-Cortina Games start and finish, and why do they spread the action across two clusters 400 km apart?
The opening ceremony is on 6 February 2026; the last medals are awarded 22 February. Organisers kept the 1956 Cortina d’Ampeiro rink and the 2014 Milano Expo speed-skating oval, so Alpine events stay in the Dolomites while skating, hockey and ceremonies sit in the Lombardy plain. Trains every 30 min on the new Trento–Milano line turn the distance into a 2 h trip, letting fans sleep in either place without rental cars.
Which new events will debut, and will they change the number of medal sets?
Ski-mountaineering gets five medals (men and women sprint, relay, plus a mixed team), and women Nordic combined finally joins the programme after 99 years. Those additions keep the total at 116 medal sets, because the sliding centre at Eugenio Monti dropped the men four-man bob to make room for the women monobob that premiered in Beijing.
Which exact weeks will the Milano-Cortina Games run, and how many competition days are squeezed between the opening and closing ceremonies?
The 25th Winter Olympics open on Friday, 6 February 2026, and close on Sunday, 22 February 17 full days of sport. Competition starts the night before the ceremony (curling mixed doubles, ski-mountaineering and ice-hockey preliminaries) and finishes a few hours before the flame is extinguished, so athletes get 18 competition windows in total.
Reviews
Oliver Hawthorne
Snow on my lashes, I squint at the calendar February 2026, Milan slips into Cortina like a secret handshake. Tell me, which midnight bus will drop me where the new ski-mountaineers breathe frost into the start gate, and whose phone-stream will still glow when the last relay of the mixed skeleton team rattles down the iced chute?
ShadowVex
Milan 2026? Cold, overpriced, same falls on ice. Still beats my couch. I’ll stream, curse judges, bet coffee on curlers, maybe cry when some kid lands triple. Book days off now, freeze beer mugs, tell boss I’m sick. February fling before tax hell.
Charlotte Wilson
I still keep the ticket stub from Sochi in my makeup pouch mascara smudged, minus-15 °C, and I was crying because the girl from Kazakhstan landed her first triple. Ten Februarys later, I’ll be on the Milan metro clutching hot chestnut paper, chasing the same goose-bumps. New sports? Women ski-big-air imagine flying over a cathedral roof. Mark 6-22 Feb, set alarms for 3 a.m. streams, and tape the schedule near your coffee maker. Cold lungs, warm heart see you at the finish.
GoldenLily
Snow again, tickets again, another city I’ll never afford. They promise new sports big whoop, I still can’t land a couch in my own flat. Milan, Cortina, shiny logos on every screen, while my January bill hums like a dying fridge. They’ll parade the torch past boutiques I can’t pronounce; I’ll count coins for oat milk. Broadcast starts at three a.m.? Perfect. My insomnia free.
Harper
My heart already racing Milan snow under my nails, curling mixed doubles on loop, espresso steam on the screen!
Daniel
Oh, 2026: Milan and Cortina join forces like two Wi-Fi routers in a snowdrift, gifting us skiing, skating, and the brand-new ski-mountaineering because nothing screams "fun" like running uphill in Spandex. Book a sofa, brew something strong, and watch athletes chase milliseconds while you chase the last cookie.