European Championships (multi-sport event)

The European Championships is a multi-sport tournament which brings together the existing European Championships of some of the continent's leading sports every four years. The inaugural edition in 2018 was staged by the host cities of Berlin, Germany and Glasgow, United Kingdom between 2 and 12 August. The second edition in 2022 took place in Munich, Germany. A host for the third edition has not been confirmed.
The various Europe-wide championships in the same disciplines that are held outside this quadrennial framework (e.g. annually in the cases of cycling, gymnastics, rowing and triathlon; biennially in the cases of athletics and aquatics) are unaffected by this event.
European Championships Management, co-founded by Paul Bristow and Marc Joerg, developed the event concept, and manages and implements the European Championships on behalf of the participating Federations. The 2018 European Athletics Championships were held in Berlin, while Glasgow hosted the Aquatics, Cycling, Gymnastics, Rowing and Triathlon along with a new European Golf Team Championships. The championships were being staged under one new brand with the 'Mark of a Champion', a star-like logo.
The second edition saw aquatics and golf remove themselves from the programme, while canoe sprint and paracanoe, sports climbing, beach volleyball, table tennis and rowing joined the event.
At the end of the second edition, European Athletic Association indicated that athletics would leave the programme for 2026 and, as with aquatics in 2022, would hold its championships on the same dates but under its own branding.
The European Broadcasting Union is a key partner in the event, broadcasting across Europe's free to air channels via its Eurovision Network, with an estimated audience of 1.03 billion. It is also being broadcast across radio and multiple digital platforms.
This competition is not related to the European Games organised by the European Olympic Committees in the 'Olympic tradition'.
The European governing bodies for athletics, aquatics, cycling, golf, gymnastics, rowing and triathlon, co-ordinated their individual continental championships as part of the first edition between 2 and 12 August 2018, hosted by the cities of Berlin (already chosen as the host for the 2018 European Athletics Championships) and Glasgow (already chosen as the host for the 2018 European Aquatics Championships, and which also hosted the events of the other sports).
The initial participating continental governing bodies, and championships, were:
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the umbrella body for the continent's free-to-air channels, was the broadcast partner for the combined championships, which were expected to generate more than 2700 hours of programming. For athletics alone, there was a 20% rise in television viewing figures compared to a traditional single-sport European Athletics Championships.
All of Europe's major free-to-air broadcasters televised the European Championships in 2018, such as BBC in the United Kingdom, ARD/ZDF in Germany, France Televisions in France, RAI in Italy and TVE in Spain. Other EBU members who signed up include VRT (Belgium), HRT (Croatia), DR (Denmark), YLE (Finland), RTÉ (Ireland), NOS (Netherlands), NRK (Norway), TVP (Poland), SRG SSR (Switzerland) and SVT/TV4 (Sweden). The level of coverage was also enhanced by a deal with Eurosport. In total, over 40 EBU members signed agreements as of April 2018. There were discussions with broadcasters in the remaining territories in Europe, plus other global territories like China, Japan and USA.
Glasgow 2018 had official partners (People Make Glasgow, Scottish Government, Strathmore Water, Spar & Eurovision) and Berlin 2018 had six official partners (Spar, Le Gruyère, Nike, Toyo Tires, Generali & Eurovision) with another tier of official supporters across the two host cities. Overall over 56 companies signed up to support the inaugural event.
To be staged between 2 and 12 August 2018, around 1,500 athletes competed at the European Athletics Championships in Berlin, whilst at the same time more than 3,000 competed in the other championships in Glasgow. Each European Championship was organised by their respective federation and host city.
On 1 August, at the Opening Party in Glasgow, a new European Championship Trophy was unveiled, which was awarded to the nation achieving the most gold medals across all seven sports during the Championships. It was presented by Katherine Grainger, Emma Fredh and Angelina Melnikova on behalf of the seven European federations involved in the event.
The second edition of the European Championships took place in Munich, Germany, in the summer of 2022.
The first step in the bidding process for 2022 was the distribution of the official Bid Information Document to interested parties, with a preliminary questionnaire to be submitted. The participating European Sports Federations were expected to announce the 2022 hosts after the first edition in August 2018.
Possible bids included (as host dates had to be 11–21 August to avoid conflicting with the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England):
In 2019, Munich was confirmed as the 2022 host.
The participating continental governing bodies, and championships, in the 2022 edition of the event, all in Munich, were:
◎ : inaugural appearance of the sport at the European Championships.
European Tour golf organisation, which discontinued the European Team Golf Championships, and LEN/European Aquatics League, which were holding their 2022 European Aquatics Championships simultaneously but separately in Rome, did not return from 2018.
In November 2023, the European federations of seven core sports (Confédération Européenne de Volleyball, European Canoe Association, Union Européenne de Cyclisme, European Rowing, International Federation of Sport Climbing, European Table Tennis Union, and Europe Triathlon) announced their commitment to the European Championships event going forward to 2034, confirming the 2026 event. The major other federations - European Athletics, European Aquatics, European Union of Gymnastics and golf's European Tour - have not so committed, with the 2026 European Athletics Championships already awarded alone to Birmingham, and the 2026 European Aquatics Championships awarded to Paris.
European Athletics, Ligue Européenne de Natation, Union Européenne de Cyclisme, FISA and the European Triathlon Union agreed in 2015 to organise their individual championships as part of the European Championships. The individual federations and the host cities began to organise the individual championships with a co-ordinated timetable and a unifying common brand. The championships included the European Athletics Championships, the European Aquatics Championships, the European Road Championships, the European Track Championships, the European Rowing Championships, and the European Triathlon Championships as well as the European Gymnastics Championships and the new European Golf Team Championships. Both gymnastics and golf formally joined the new event during that year.
In the lead up to the announcement of the programme for the second edition of the combined European Championships, both the European Tour and LEN revealed that their respective sports would not be part of the event; the European Team Golf Championship was suspended after one edition, while the 2022 European Aquatics Championships was moved to Rome, Italy. Nine sports were confirmed for 2022 edition: athletics, cycling, gymnastics, rowing, and triathlon returned, while the four new sports of beach volleyball, canoe sprint, sports climbing and table tennis were added. The European Aquatics Championships were held over the same dates as the combined championships.
The European Championships Trophy, one of the unifying elements of the multi-sport event, is awarded to the nation that finishes top of the overall medal table featuring all participating sports.
Medal table after 2022 European Championship.
^[1] Not included in the official medal table.