Men's 400 metres world record progression

The first world record in the 400 m for men (athletics) was recognized by the International Amateur Athletics Federation, now known as World Athletics, in 1912. The IAAF ratified Charles Reidpath's 48.2 s performance set at that year's Stockholm Olympics as a world record, but it also recognized the superior mark over 440 yards (402.336 metres) run by Maxie Long in 1900 as a world record.

Up to and including 2021, World Athletics has ratified 24 outdoor world records in the event. ^[1]

The following tables show the world record progression in the men's 400 metres, as ratified by World Athletics.

Indoor

Indoor records are run on a shorter 200 metres track. "y" indicates marks were set over the 440 yards (402.34 m) imperial distance, and an asterisk indicates a record was repeated. All records since Schönlebe's 45.41 in 1986 were ratified by the IAAF. ^[2]

Men's indoor 400 metres world record progression

Time	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date
Manual timing
50.8y	Harry Hillman	United States	New York	1907
50.4y	James Rosenberger	United States	New York	February 17, 1911
49.6y	Thomas Halpin	United States	Buffalo	March 15, 1913
49.6y	Walter Koppisch	United States	Buffalo	March 17, 1923
48.9y	Bill Henke	United States	Iowa City	February 28, 1931
48.9y*	Ray Ellinwood	United States	Chicago	March 14, 1936
48.2y	Roy Cochran	United States	Chicago	March 9, 1940
48.1y	Bob Ufer	United States	Chicago	March 7, 1942
47.9	Roy Cochran	United States	New York	March 25, 1942
47.9y	Herbert McKenley	Jamaica	Chicago	March 15, 1947
47.9y*	Dave Mills	United States	Bloomington	February 3, 1962
47.9y*	Elzie Higginbottom	United States	Madison	February 10, 1962
47.9y*	Elzie Higginbottom	United States	Minneapolis	February 17, 1962
47.9y*	Elzie Higginbottom	United States	Madison	February 24, 1962
47.8y	Dave Mills	United States	East Lansing	March 3, 1962
47.8y*	Jean-Pierre Boccardo	France	Stuttgart	February 14, 1964
47.6y	Ray Saddler	United States	Louisville	February 27, 1965
46.8	Mike Larrabee	United States	Berlin	April 8, 1965
46.2y	Tommie Smith	United States	Louisville	February 18, 1967
46.1	Marcello Fiasconaro	Italy	Genova	March 15, 1972
45.9	Alfons Brijdenbach	Belgium	Sofia	February 17, 1974
45.9*	Mikhail Linge	Soviet Union	Moscow	February 16, 1980
Automatic timing
47.55	Jan Balachowski	Poland	Madrid	March 10, 1968
47.09	Andrzej Badenski	Poland	Madrid	March 10, 1968
46.38	Luciano Susanj	Yugoslavia	Rotterdam	March 11, 1973
46.21	Karel Kolar	Czechoslovakia	Wien	February 25, 1979
45.96	Hartmut Weber	West Germany	Sindelfingen	February 7, 1981
45.79	Antonio McKay	United States	Gainesville	February 11, 1984
45.60	Thomas Schönlebe	East Germany	Paris-Bercy	January 19, 1985
45.56	Todd Bennett	Great Britain	Piraeus	March 3, 1985
45.41	Thomas Schönlebe	East Germany	Wien	February 9, 1986
45.05	Thomas Schönlebe	East Germany	Sindelfingen	February 5, 1988
45.05	Danny Everett	United States	Stuttgart	February 4, 1990
45.02	Danny Everett	United States	Stuttgart	February 2, 1992
44.97	Michael Johnson	United States	Reno	February 10, 1995
44.63	Michael Johnson	United States	Atlanta	March 4, 1995
44.57	Kerron Clement	United States	Fayetteville, AR	March 12, 2005
44.52	Michael Norman	United States	College Station, TX	March 10, 2018

Outdoor

Records 1912–1976

Time	Auto	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date
47.8y		Maxie Long	United States	New York, USA	September 29, 1900 [1]
48.2		Charles Reidpath	United States	Stockholm, Sweden	July 13, 1912 [1]
47.4y		Ted Meredith	United States	Cambridge, USA	May 27, 1916 [1] [3]
47.6		Eric Liddell	United Kingdom	Paris, France	July 11, 1924 [note 1] [4] : 49
47.0		Emerson Spencer	United States	Palo Alto, USA	May 12, 1928 [1]
46.4y		Ben Eastman	United States	Palo Alto, California, USA	March 26, 1932 [1]
46.2	46.28	Bill Carr	United States	Los Angeles, USA	August 5, 1932 [1]
46.1		Archie Williams	United States	Chicago, USA	June 19, 1936 [1]
46.0		Rudolf Harbig	Germany	Frankfurt am Main, Germany	August 12, 1939 [1]
		Grover Klemmer	United States	Philadelphia, USA	June 6, 1941 [1] [5]
46.0y		Herb McKenley	Jamaica	Berkeley, USA	June 5, 1948 [1]
45.9	46.00	Herb McKenley	Jamaica	Milwaukee, USA	July 2, 1948 [1]
45.8		George Rhoden	Jamaica	Eskilstuna, Sweden	August 22, 1950 [1]
45.4A	45.68	Lou Jones	United States	Mexico City, Mexico	March 18, 1955 [1]
45.2		Lou Jones	United States	Los Angeles, USA	June 30, 1956 [1]
44.9	45.07	Otis Davis	United States	Rome, Italy	September 6, 1960 [1]
	45.08	Carl Kaufmann	Germany	Rome, Italy	September 6, 1960 [1]
44.9y		Adolph Plummer	United States	Tempe, USA	May 25, 1963 [1]
44.9		Mike Larrabee	United States	Los Angeles, USA	September 12, 1964 [1]
44.5+		Tommie Smith	United States	San Jose, USA	May 20, 1967 [1]
44.1A	44.19	Larry James	United States	Echo Summit, USA	September 14, 1968 [1]
43.8A	43.86	Lee Evans	United States	Mexico City, Mexico	October 18, 1968 [1]

(+) plus sign denotes en route time during longer race
"y" denotes time for 440 yards, ratified as a record for this event
"A" indicates that the time was set at altitude.

The "Time" column indicates the ratified mark; the "Auto" column indicates a fully automatic time that was also recorded in the event when hand-timed marks were used for official records, or which was the basis for the official mark, rounded to the 10th of a second, depending on the rules then in place.

Records post-1976

From 1975, the IAAF accepted separate automatically electronically timed records for events up to 400 metres. Starting January 1, 1977, the IAAF required fully automatic timing to the hundredth of a second for these events. ^[1]

Lee Evans' 1968 Olympic gold medal victory time of 43.86 was the fastest recorded result to that time.

Time	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date	Duration of record
43.86 A	Lee Evans	United States	Mexico City, Mexico	October 18, 1968 [1]	19 years, 9 months and 30 days
43.29	Butch Reynolds	United States	Zürich, Switzerland	August 17, 1988 [1]	11 years and 9 days
43.18	Michael Johnson	United States	Seville, Spain	August 26, 1999 [1]	16 years, 11 months and 19 days
43.03	Wayde van Niekerk	South Africa	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	August 14, 2016 [6]	9 years, 2 months and 5 days

For the period when the record automatic time was Lee Evans' mark of 43.86, the progression excluding races run at high altitude (above 1,000 metres) was as follows:

Time	Athlete	Nationality	Location of race	Date	Duration of record
44.95	Lee Evans	United States	Winnipeg, Canada	July 30, 1967	4 years and 2 days
44.60	John Smith	United States	Cali, Colombia [7]	August 1, 1971	4 years, 11 months and 28 days
44.26	Alberto Juantorena	Cuba	Montreal, Canada	July 29, 1976	10 years, 9 months and 4 days
44.10	Butch Reynolds	United States	Columbus, Ohio, USA	May 3, 1987	1 year, 2 months and 17 days
43.93	Butch Reynolds	United States	Indianapolis, USA	July 20, 1988	28 days

Notes

1. Eric Liddell's 1924 Olympic Games victory was initially ratified as a world record by the IAAF, despite being slower than Ted Meredith's mark from 1916. The IAAF rescinded the record on August 7, 1928.

References

1. "12th IAAF World Championships In Athletics: IAAF Statistics Handbook. Berlin 2009" (PDF). Monte Carlo: IAAF Media & Public Relations Department. 2009. pp. Pages 546, 547. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 29, 2011. Retrieved August 2, 2009.
2. "Main > Records Progression - World Indoor Records Men, 400 m". trackfield.brinkster.net.
3. "The Official Report of the Games of the 8th Olympiade" (PDF). Paris, FR. 1924. p. 107. Retrieved 21 April 2011.
4. Hymans, Richard; Matrahazi, Imre. "IAAF World Records Progression" (PDF) (2015 ed.). International Association of Athletics Federations . Retrieved April 30, 2018.
5. "HD Stock Video Footage - Track and Field events at Franklin Field in Philadelphia".
6. "Men's 400m Results" (PDF). Rio 2016. International Olympic Committee. 14 August 2016. Archived from the original (PDF) on 20 September 2016. Retrieved 3 September 2016.
7. The altitude of the Estadio Olímpico Pascual Guerrero is approximately 1000m.