2023 World Athletics Championships – Men's 200 metres

Men's 200 metres
at the 2023 World Championships
Men's 200 metres ; at the 2023 World Championships
	Final of the event
Venue	National Athletics Centre
Dates	23 August (heats); 24 August (semi-finals); 25 August (final)
Winning time	19.52
Medalists
	← 2022 2025 →

Last updated September 08, 2025

The men's 200 metres at the 2023 World Athletics Championships was held at the National Athletics Centre in Budapest from 23 to 25 August 2023.^[1] The winning margin was 0.23 seconds.

Summary

As the carts were bringing the semi-finalists to the track from the warm-up area, one cart T-boned the other. Andrew Hudson received minor injuries with broken glass getting into his eye. The first semi was moved to last in the order to give Hudson and the other athletes a chance to recover. A relaxed defending champion Noah Lyles came through as the #1 qualifier. Hudson finished fourth in the semi-final, but was granted the extra lane in the final.

In the final, the start was fairly even, with the exception of Joseph Fahnbulleh's notoriously slow start, accentuated by Hudson's fast start in lane 1 next to him. As they were beginning to exit the turn, the three Americans, Lyles, Erriyon Knighton, and Kenny Bednarek, along with Letsile Tebogo all on the outside of the tracking Zharnel Hughes, were still even. With Lyles' notorious closing speed, that was bad news for the other competitors. From there, true to form, Lyles opened a gap that continued to widen to the finish. The next two runners to gain separation were the youngsters, 19 year old Knighton, then 20 year old Tebogo. Lyles had 3 metres over Knighton at the finish. Knighton was barely a metre clear of Tebogo. Lyles' 19.52 winning time equalled the #14 time in history, tied with two previous efforts from Lyles (but he's also run faster on four other occasions). Knighton's 19.75 means he owns all of the top 12 times ever run by a U20 athlete. This World Championship title was a three-peat for Lyles and completed the second leg of his pre-meet announced plan to take three gold medals.

Records

Before the competition records were as follows:^[2]

Record	Athlete & Nat.	Perf.	Location	Date
World record	Usain Bolt (JAM)	19.19	Berlin, Germany	20 August 2009
Championship record	Usain Bolt (JAM)	19.19	Berlin, Germany	20 August 2009
World Leading	Noah Lyles (USA)	19.47	London, United Kingdom	23 July 2023
African Record	Letsile Tebogo (BOT)	19.50	London, United Kingdom	23 July 2023
Asian Record	Xie Zhenye (CHN)	19.88	London, United Kingdom	21 July 2019
North, Central American and Caribbean record	Usain Bolt (JAM)	19.19	Berlin, Germany	20 August 2009
South American Record	Alonso Edward (PAN)	19.81	Berlin, Germany	20 August 2009
European Record	Pietro Mennea (ITA)	19.72	Mexico City, Mexico	12 September 1979
Oceanian record	Peter Norman (AUS)	20.06	Mexico City, Mexico	16 October 1968

Qualification standard

The standard to qualify automatically for entry was 20.16 seconds.^[3]

Schedule

The event schedule, in local time (UTC+2), is as follows:^[1]

Date	Time	Round
23 August	12:15	Heats
24 August	20:20	Semi-finals
25 August	21:50	Final

Results

Round 1 (heats)

Round 1 took place on 23 August. The first 3 athletes in each heat ( Q ) and the next 3 fastest ( q ) qualified for the semi-final.^[4]

Heat 1

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	4	Zharnel Hughes	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	19.99	Q
2	2	Aaron Brown	Canada (CAN)	20.08	Q
3	5	Luxolo Adams	South Africa (RSA)	20.15	Q, SB
4	8	Shota Iizuka	Japan (JPN)	20.27	q, SB
5	7	Taymir Burnet	Netherlands (NED)	20.31	q, PB
6	3	Eseosa Desalu	Italy (ITA)	20.49	SB
7	6	Gediminas Truskauskas	Lithuania (LTU)	20.90
8	9	Franko Burraj	Albania (ALB)	21.52
^[5]				Wind: 0.0 m/s

Heat 2

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	8	Noah Lyles	United States (USA)	20.05	Q
2	4	Andrew Hudson	Jamaica (JAM)	20.25	Q
3	9	Ondřej Macík	Czech Republic (CZE)	20.40	Q
4	3	Tapiwanashe Makarawu	Zimbabwe (ZIM)	20.64
5	5	Ján Volko	Slovakia (SVK)	20.69
6	2	Jorge Vides	Brazil (BRA)	20.80
7	1	Ko Seung-hwan [ de ]	South Korea (KOR)	21.09
8	6	Leroy Kamau	Papua New Guinea (PNG)	21.18
9	7	Jessy Franco	Gibraltar (GIB)	22.04
^[5]				Wind: -0.1 m/s

Heat 3

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	7	Letsile Tebogo	Botswana (BOT)	20.22	Q
2	5	Joseph Fahnbulleh	Liberia (LBR)	20.42	Q
3	9	William Reais	Switzerland (SUI)	20.50	Q
4	3	Joshua Hartmann	Germany (GER)	20.51
5	2	Blessing Akwasi Afrifah	Israel (ISR)	20.73
6	6	Aidan Murphy	Australia (AUS)	20.90
7	4	Marcos Santos	Angola (ANG)	21.05	NR
8	8	Hachim Maaroufou	Comoros (COM)	21.29
^[5]				Wind: -1.4 m/s

Heat 4

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	8	Brendon Rodney	Canada (CAN)	20.14	Q, SB
2	6	Renan Correa	Brazil (BRA)	20.44	Q
3	2	Shaun Maswanganyi	South Africa (RSA)	20.56	Q
4	5	Koki Ueyama	Japan (JPN)	20.66
5	3	Nadale Buntin	Saint Kitts and Nevis (SKN)	20.90 [.894]
5	4	Zoltán Wahl	Hungary (HUN)	20.90 [.894]
7	7	Mohamed Obaid Alsadi	Oman (OMN)	21.39
—	9	James Dadzie	Ghana (GHA)	DNF
^[5]				Wind: -0.2 m/s

Heat 5

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	8	Towa Uzawa	Japan (JPN)	20.34	Q
2	7	Courtney Lindsey	United States (USA)	20.39	Q
3	3	Rasheed Dwyer	Jamaica (JAM)	20.40	Q
4	5	Tarsis Gracious Orogot	Uganda (UGA)	20.44	q
5	4	Yang Chun-han	Chinese Taipei (TPE)	20.82
6	9	Ramil Guliyev	Turkey (TUR)	20.89
7	6	Mindia Endeladze [ de ]	Georgia (GEO)	21.20
—	2	Emmanuel Eseme	Cameroon (CMR)	DNS
^[5]				Wind: -0.2 m/s

Heat 6

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	9	Erriyon Knighton	United States (USA)	20.17	Q
2	7	Andre De Grasse	Canada (CAN)	20.28	Q
3	8	Sinesipho Dambile	South Africa (RSA)	20.34	Q
4	3	Filippo Tortu	Italy (ITA)	20.46
5	6	Joseph Amoah	Ghana (GHA)	20.56
6	5	Sibusiso Matsenjwa	Eswatini (SWZ)	20.88
7	2	Guy Maganga Gorra	Gabon (GAB)	21.04
8	4	Yeykell Eliuth Romero	Nicaragua (NCA)	21.71
^[5]				Wind: -0.5 m/s

Heat 7

Rank	Lane	Athlete	Nation	Time	Notes
1	5	Kenneth Bednarek	United States (USA)	20.01	Q
2	7	Alexander Ogando	Dominican Republic (DOM)	20.14	Q
3	6	Alaba Akintola	Nigeria (NGR)	20.54	Q
4	3	Alonso Edward	Panama (PAN)	20.63
5	4	Lucas Rodrigues da Silva [ de ]	Brazil (BRA)	20.86
6	9	Taha Hussein Yaseen	Iraq (IRQ)	21.01
7	8	Albert Komański	Poland (POL)	21.16
—	2	Ryan Zeze	France (FRA)	DQ	TR 16.8
^[5]				Wind: -0.1 m/s

Semi-final

The semi-final took place on 24 August, with the 24 athletes involved being split into 3 heats of 8 athletes each. The first 2 athletes in each heat ( Q ) and the next 2 fastest ( q ) will qualify for the final.^[6]