LA Olympics 2028: The expensive, annoying ticket crashout

CultureThe great 2028 Olympic ticket crashout, explainedOrganizers promised LA 2028 tickets would be accessible and affordable. It didn’t feel that way when I tried to buy them.by Alex Abad-SantosApr 27, 2026, 11:15 AM UTCShareGiftIf you failed or were priced out of tickets to the 2028 Olympics, you’re not alone. Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times via Getty ImagesAlex Abad-Santos is a senior correspondent who explains what society obsesses over, from Marvel and movies to fitness and skin care. He came to Vox in 2014. Prior to that, he worked at The Atlantic.Buying tickets to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics is kind of like having a megawealthy friend talk to you about the hobbies that they enjoy.Do you fence? Do you like cricket? Badminton’s fun, right? Like a diabolically rich friend, the Olympics are also, at the same time, a test of financial responsibility.How much would you pay to watch people gracefully sword fight? Do you think you could learn to love cricket if you were spending $100? Would you like to go into mild credit card debt to see a less beautiful version of tennis? Ultimately, I said no to my rich friend, the Olympics. I wasn’t alone.As so many potential LA 2028 spectators have expressed, the entire ticket-buying process — email registration, a finicky website, specific time slots, opaque inventory — was bad. The fact that prices were exorbitant, as much as $5,000, after so many assurances from organizers and elected officials that these Games would be financially accessible, including $28 tickets available to locals, with nearly 50 percent of all tickets costing less than $200, and only 5 percent of tickets costing more than $1,000.I experienced the frustration of the terrible website, a bad time slot, and the sticker shock firsthand. I eventually logged off, empty-handed, during a spiral in which I found myself seriously considering spending money to see javelin, a sport I have never once thought about.Here’s how the great 2028 Olympic ticket mess went down.Trust the process (or not) of buying 2028 Olympics ticketsThe road to disappointment began this winter.On January 14, 2026, organizers opened registration for the first ticket drop, scheduled for April. Interested Olympic spectators were invited to submit their email addresses anytime until March 18, and residents of Los Angeles and Oklahoma City (softball and canoe slalom will take place there) had the opportunity to register for a locals-only presale. You were then entered into a random draw for a chance to purchase tickets, and those lucky enough to be selected were given a specific time slot between April 9 and April 19 to purchase tickets. Entrants living in LA and OKC who were selected were assigned a slot in a window that began a week earlier, on April 2.The tickets are categorized using an alphabetical tier system in which Tier A accounts for the most expensive tickets, Tier B is the second-most expensive, with prices decreasing all the way down to Tier J. It quickly gets confusing, though, because there’s no standard tier pricing across events — so the Tier A tickets for swimming will cost more (possibly thousands more) than the Tier A tickets for badminton.Here’s the other wrinkle: Not every event will have all the lettered tiers. In other words, some venues may only go down to D, while a bigger stadium or arena may go all the way to J. But since there’s no standard pricing, an E-tier ticket in a bigger venue could theoretically end up being more pricey than a…

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