# Swimming at the 1980 Summer Olympics – Men's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay

The men's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay event at the 1980 Summer Olympics was held on 23 July at the Swimming Pool at the Olimpiysky Sports Complex.

## Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
| World record | United States (USA) Rowdy Gaines Bruce Furniss Bill Forrester Bobby Hackett | 7:20.82 | West Berlin, West Germany | 24 August 1978 |
| Olympic record | United States (USA) Mike Bruner Bruce Furniss John Naber Jim Montgomery | 7:23.22 | Montreal, Canada | 21 July 1976 |

## Results
### Heats

| Rank | Heat | Nation | Swimmers | Time | Notes |
| 1 | 2 | Soviet Union | Sergey Rusin (1:52.55) Sergey Krasyuk (1:53.09) Yuri Presekin (1:52.21) Ivar Stukolkin (1:51.54) | 7:29.39 | Q |
| 2 | 1 | East Germany | Frank Kühne (1:54.18) Detlev Grabs (1:53.68) Frank Pfütze (1:52.46) Rainer Strohbach (1:52.35) | 7:32.67 | Q |
| 3 | 2 | Brazil | Jorge Fernandes (1:53.49) Marcus Mattioli (1:52.76) Cyro Delgado (1:53.20) Djan Madruga (1:53.36) | 7:32.81 | Q |
| 4 | 2 | Australia | Mark Tonelli (1:53.99) Max Metzker (1:54.85) Mark Kerry (1:53.47) Graeme Brewer (1:51.75) | 7:34.06 | Q |
| 5 | 2 | Sweden | Michael Söderlund (1:53.16) Per-Alvar Magnusson (1:52.77) Anders Rutqvist (1:54.43) Per-Ola Quist (1:53.98) | 7:34.34 | Q |
| 6 | 1 | France | Marc Lazzaro (1:54.19) Dominique Petit (1:55.25) Pascal Lagat (1:53.44) Fabien Noël (1:51.93) | 7:34.81 | Q |
| 7 | 1 | Italy | Federico Silvestri (1:56.74) Raffaele Franceschi (1:53.38) Andrea Ceccarini (1:54.15) Paolo Revelli (1:52.70) | 7:36.97 | Q |
| 8 | 1 | Great Britain | Douglas Campbell (1:53.99) Mark Taylor (1:55.75) Kevin Lee (1:54.27) Andrew Astbury (1:53.35) | 7:37.36 | Q |
| 9 | 2 | Czechoslovakia | Daniel Machek (1:55.10) Miloslav Rolko (1:56.42) Petr Adamec (1:55.59) Radek Havel (1:55.07) | 7:42.18 | |
| 10 | 2 | Spain | David López-Zubero (1:53.50) Ramón Lavín (1:55.10) Juan Carlos Vallejo (1:57.99) Juan Pablo Barro (1:56.10) | 7:42.69 | |
| 11 | 1 | Netherlands | Cees Vervoorn (1:55.16) Peter Drost (1:56.79) Cees Jan Winkel (1:56.94) Fred Eefting (1:53.96) | 7:42.85 | |
| 12 | 1 | Algeria | Abdelhakim Bitat (2:03.87) Reda Yadi (2:05.35) Mohamed Bendahmane (2:07.81) Mohamed Halimi (2:06.19) | 8:23.22 | |
| | 2 | Bulgaria | Petar Kochanov Krasimir Tumanov Petar Stoyanov Tsvetan Golomeev | DSQ | |

### Final

| Rank | Nation | Swimmers | Time |
| | Soviet Union | Sergey Kopliakov (1:50.00) Vladimir Salnikov (1:51.09) Ivar Stukolkin (1:52.04) Andrey Krylov (1:50.37) | 7:23.50 |
| | East Germany | Frank Pfütze (1:52.96) Jörg Woithe (1:51.78) Detlev Grabs (1:52.24) Rainer Strohbach (1:51.62) | 7:28.60 |
| | Brazil | Jorge Fernandes (1:52.61) Marcus Mattioli (1:52.94) Cyro Delgado (1:52.35) Djan Madruga (1:51.40) | 7:29.30 |
| 4 | Sweden | Michael Söderlund (1:52.54) Pelle Wikström (1:52.70) Per-Alvar Magnusson (1:53.01) Thomas Lejdström (1:51.85) | 7:30.10 |
| 5 | Italy | Paolo Revelli (1:53.14) Raffaele Franceschi (1:51.56) Andrea Ceccarini (1:54.91) Fabrizio Rampazzo (1:50.76) | 7:30.37 |
| 6 | Great Britain | Douglas Campbell (1:53.56) Philip Hubble (1:52.96) Martin Smith (1:52.69) Andrew Astbury (1:51.60) | 7:30.81 |
| 7 | Australia | Graeme Brewer (1:52.57) Mark Tonelli (1:53.47) Mark Kerry (1:52.64) Ron McKeon (1:52.14) | 7:30.82 |
| 8 | France | Fabien Noël (1:52.73) Marc Lazzaro (1:53.79) Dominique Petit (1:54.88) Pascal Lagat (1:54.68) | 7:36.08 |