on The Mall 2025 London Marathon was aspiring to become the largest marathon held anywhere in the world, ever. Its target? To surpass the existing world record of 55,646 finishers, set by the New York City Marathon in November 2024, and welcome more than 56,000 on The Mall Richmond Marathon 2025: Your ultimate guide.
But while all eyes were on London, another marathon came along with a huge field of participants. The race in question? The 2025 Paris Marathon.
Held on Sunday (13 April), just two weeks before this year’s London Marathon sets off from Greenwich, the latest edition of the Paris Marathon saw an immense sea of runners descend upon the French capital, with 56,950 participants taking on the course. Of those participants, 55,499 made it all the way to the finish line – which is just 147 people short of the world record-breaking finisher count at the New York City Marathon last year.
According to the Paris Marathon’s race report, just over half (51%) of the near-57,000 participants were first-time marathon runners. This alone shows the growing appeal of the 26.2-mile distance across nations, with a third (33%) of the field comprising international runners. Slowly but surely, more women are now running the Paris Marathon, too. Just under a third of participants (31%) in 2025 were women, which is up from 28% in 2024 and 26% in 2023.
Although the Paris Marathon is not one of the seven Abbott World Marathon Majors, it is – as the statistics prove – anything but a minor or unpopular event. Only last year, the 2024 Paris Marathon saw 53,899 runners cross its finish line, which, at the time, was the greatest-ever number of people to complete a single marathon. This narrowly outdid the previous record of 53,627 finishers, which was held for several years by the 2019 New York City Marathon.
However, the 2024 Paris Marathon’s mark was quickly superseded by the 50Marathon des Sables: Everything you need to know, held that September, which had 54,154 finishers. Then, a mere two months later, as mentioned above, the 2024 New York City Marathon came back to reclaim the title.
Given the ever-growing participation figures at big-name races, it is uncertain how large the Paris Marathon – or indeed any race – will grow in the coming years. But, with around 6,000 Paris Marathon participants raising nearly €5 million for almost 300 charities this year alone, there’s an argument that big fields can lead to great things.
The next Paris Marathon will take place on Sunday 12 April 2026. Early bird entries will open on 22 April 2025, while general entries will open on 24 April 2025.
