New York Road Runners Unveils the 2026 New York City Marathon Medal

The medal waiting for finishers of the New York City Marathon on Nov. 1 is a little bigger than usual, and New York Road Runners says that is on purpose. The organization unveiled the 2026 design on Wednesday: a ring of New York’s skyline, shaped like a sunburst, with the Verrazzano-Narrows, Pulaski, Queensboro, Willis Avenue and Madison Avenue bridges picked out in it. It marks 50 years since the race first went through all five boroughs, and 50 years since anyone first got a medal for finishing it.

Made of zinc with an electroplated gold finish, it measures 3.5 inches across. The center medallion hasn’t changed from last year and is still 2.12 inches wide, so the extra size all comes from the skyline built around it. NYRR drew that skyline as one continuous circle, meant to show the boroughs joined together. The ribbon takes its look from the 1970s and carries the race logo, a 50th anniversary mark and all five boroughs.

“To honor the 50th anniversary of the 5-boro New York City Marathon course, our 2026 TCS New York City Marathon finisher medal pays homage to the growth, resilience, and power of the five boroughs over the past 50 years,” Juliette Morris, NYRR’s chief marketing and digital officer, said in the announcement.

Fifty Years of Finisher Medals

Just 55 runners finished the first edition in 1970, all of it run on loops inside Central Park. On Oct. 24, 1976, timed to the U.S. Bicentennial, it left the park for Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Manhattan, with 2,090 runners in the field, according to the Brooklyn Eagle. Bill Rodgers and Miki Gorman won, and every finisher that day received the first official New York City Marathon medal, a much simpler design that NYRR photographed beside this year’s for the reveal. NYRR is already honoring the five people who pushed the race out of the park as part of the anniversary.

Last year a record 59,226 runners finished, the largest marathon in recorded history, and more than 240,000 people applied for this year’s race, with only about 1 percent getting in through the drawing.

The Team Behind the Design

Creative director Thomas Cabus and design lead Keziah Makoundou, who worked on this medal with designer Adam Koon, head of marketing strategy Emily Casey and Morris, were also behind the 2025 medal. That one had ribbed diagonal stripes tracing the elevation of the course, so a runner could feel the bridges and the Central Park hills with a fingertip, and braille on the back, as Fast Company reported last fall.

NYRR says the team spent a year on the new one and sketched 26 concepts before choosing the design now in production.

Within hours of last year’s race, some finishers had already put their 2025 medals up on eBay for $80 to $125, and a medal from the 1986 race sold for $205.

NYRR expects close to 60,000 runners to finish in Central Park on Nov. 1. The organization is also aiming to raise $100 million through its official charity program, which turns 20 this year.