Olympics opening ceremony live updates as 2026 Winter Games kick off in Milano Cortina

The 2026 Winter Olympics are bringing thousands of athletes from around the world together for more than two weeks of competition on snow and ice.

From the athletes and events to records and costs, the Games are a gold mine for statistics.

Here's a look at the 2026 Winter Olympics by the numbers:

2: Number of previous times Italy has hosted Winter Olympic Games 

Italy first hosted the Winter Olympics in 1956 in Cortina d'Ampezzo, followed by the 2006 Games in Turin. 

The country has also hosted the Summer Olympics once, in Rome in 1960.

8,494: Square miles the venues for the Winter Olympics will cover

The 2026 Games will be the first Olympics co-hosted by two cities, with competitions held across 13 venues in Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo.

The dual host cities mean it will become the most widespread Games in Olympic history, according to the International Olympic Committee, spanning nearly 8,500 square miles of northern Italy.

Milan and Cortina are about 250 miles apart by road, nearly a five-hour drive.

Read other stats here.

Pita Taufatofua, the multi-sport athlete who gained fame by proudly carrying the Tonga national flag at multiple opening ceremonies in a traditional shirtless outfit, is returning after being absent from the last two Olympic Games.

Earlier this week, Olympic organizers announced Taufatofua was chosen as one of the 10 Olympic flagbearers at tonight's opening ceremony.

Taufatofua first got international attention when he bared his chest at the 2026 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro. He then braved the freezing temperatures in PyeongChang two years later at the 2018 Winter Games, wearing sandals and a ta'ovala (a Tongan mat wrapped around his waist). He returned to carry his nation's flag at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Games.

Taufatofua, who did not qualify for the 2022 Beijing Games and the 2024 Paris Games, said in a comment on an Instagram post announcing the flagbearers for the Milano Cortina Games that he is "Feeling humbled to walk next to these true legends."

Other Olympic flagbearers include: Rebeca Andrade (Brazil), Eliud Kipchoge (Kenya) and Franco Nones (Italy).

The theme of the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games opening ceremony is "Harmony," an especially potent message with many populations exposed to violence.

Opening ceremony creative director Marco Balich recently told the Associated Press that the concept of an Olympic Truce, which originated in ancient Greece and was revived in the 1990s, is even more urgent this year.

The truce aims to promote peace and dialogue through sport by ceasing hostilities for a week before the Olympics and a week after the Paralympics, which close March 15.

Some 1,200 volunteers have been rehearsing since November for today's show.

The ceremony will also include a tribute to the late Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani, who died in September. Armani had long designed the Italian team's Olympic uniforms, and his legacy as one of the founders of Italian ready-to-wear is tightly tied to Milan.

-CBS/AP

There will be two cauldrons — an Olympic first — inspired by Leonardo da Vinci's geometric studies: one in Milan, at the Arco della Pace, about 2½ miles from San Siro Stadium, and the other at Piazza Dibona in Cortina, some five hours and 250 miles away. The cauldrons will be lit simultaneously.

However, the identities of the final torchbearers won't be revealed to the world until they step into the spotlight later today.

-CBS/AP

Blink and you might miss it. Luge is the fastest sport on ice, where milliseconds matter. So every push, every paddle and every turn is critical. 

Athletes like Team USA's Jonathan Gustafson race down an ice-covered track at speeds that can top 90 miles an hour — no seat belts or brakes. The fastest time wins. 

"I would describe luge as really just extreme sledding. Like anything any kid does when they're younger, get that plastic tube and down a hill. We're pretty similar to that, just a lot more advanced," Gustafson told "CBS Mornings." 

Gustafson will compete in the men's single luge at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics on Saturday, his second time competing in the winter games. He last competed in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

Read more from his "CBS Mornings" interview here.

CBS News' Kelly O'Grady is at a Milan megastore on the hunt for Olympic mascots Tina and Milo - and also some of the most popular Olympic merchandise.

From purple jackets to stuffed animals, swag from the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games is being scooped up fast.

Pope Leo XIV, an avid sports fan, marked the start of the Winter Games on Friday by extolling the positive values of sport and fair play while warning that the pursuit of profits and performance risked corrupting sport entirely.

In a message entitled "Life in Abundance," Leo traced the history of Christian philosophers and popes who identified sports and leisure activities as beneficial for both physical and spiritual development.

He called for sport to be accessible to both poor people and women, especially, and for fans to refrain from turning sport into a fanatical religion. Athletes, too, he said, must refrain from narcissism and becoming obsessed with their image and success.

"The cult of image and performance, amplified by media and digital platforms, risks fragmenting the person, separating body from mind and spirit," he warned.

True sport, he said, calls for a "shared ethical accord" between competitors, where the rules of the game are accepted and the integrity of the contest is respected.

"Accepting the limits of one's body, the limits of time and fatigue, and respecting the established rules means recognizing that success comes from discipline, perseverance and loyalty," he said.

Leo, 70, religiously plays tennis and swims, and is a longtime fan of the Chicago White Sox.

The pontiff drew on his experience as a tennis player in his message, noting the cultural and spiritual benefits of the so-called "flow experience," of being challenged beyond one's level, that both fans and players alike can experience in a prolonged tennis rally.

"The reason this is one of the most enjoyable parts of a match is that each player pushes the other to the limit of his or her skill level," Leo wrote. "The experience is exhilarating, and the two players challenge each other to improve; this is as true for two ten-year-olds as it is for two professional champions."

-CBS/AP

Lindsey Vonn. Alex Ferreira. Alysa Liu. Brittany Bowe. Maxim Naumov.

These are just some of the more than 230 American athletes representing Team USA at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics.

Olympians from Team USA have won a total of 330 Winter Olympic medals through Beijing 2022 — second only to winter sports powerhouse Norway.

Take a look at some of the Team USA athletes to watch over the next few weeks in Italy.

Madison Chock and Evan Bates rock-and-rolled their way to a world-best 91.06 points in the rhythm dance Friday to open the team competition at the Milan Cortina Olympics.

Cheered on by a crowd that included Vice President JD Vance, his family and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Chock and Bates were able to secure their team the maximum 10 points for their Lenny Kravitz-inspired dance while making a big early statement.

The three-time world champions, Chock and Bates, are the favorites to win individual Olympic gold later in the Winter Games.

Read more here.

-CBS/AP

As the 2026 Winter Olympic Games kick off, at least a dozen athletes will represent AIN.

The three-letter acronym isn't an abbreviation of a country delegation — its athletes are tied to Russia, whose nation's flag will not be present following a series of doping scandals and Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine.

AIN athletes will also include competitors from Belarus, which was banned as a country in Paris 2024 over its involvement in the war.

What does AIN stand for?

AIN is an acronym of the French term "Athlètes Individuels Neutres," meaning "Individual Neutral Athletes." French is one of the two official languages of the Olympic Games, along with English.

Read more here.

The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee is sending its biggest Winter Olympics team ever to the 2026 Games in Italy — 232 Olympic athletes representing 32 home states.

The CBS News data team mapped the home states of the athletes to identify which states had the most representation.

Colorado leads with 30 athletes, followed by Minnesota, which is home to 24, and California, with 19.

States with the fewest competitors include Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, North Dakota and Washington, D.C., each with just one, while 18 states have no athletes on the team.

Read more here.

The Olympic torch arrived in Milan on Thursday evening ahead of today's opening ceremony to officially kickstart the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games.

The torch, which was lit in Olympia, Greece, on Nov. 26, 2025, arrived in Italy on Dec. 5 and has since traveled through all the regions of the country, building anticipation for the Winter Games.

Today, the torch is making its way through Milan before reaching the San Siro Stadium for the lighting of the Olympic flame.

Speedskater Erin Jackson and bobsledder Frank Del Duca were chosen as the U.S. flagbearers for today's opening ceremony — and they might be the perfect pair to lead Team USA into the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics.

Jackson is the first Black woman to win an individual gold medal at a Winter Olympics and Del Duca is a sergeant in the Army with deep Italian roots. They were selected by a group of their fellow Olympians as the U.S. flagbearers.

Jackson will become the eighth U.S. speedskater to carry the flag into an Olympics, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee said, while Del Duca will be the first bobsledder to carry the flag at an opening in 70 years.

Read more here.

The athletic events at the 2026 Milano Cortina Games began on Feb. 4 with training sessions and early rounds for multiple disciplines, including curling, ice hockey and snowboarding.

The first medals of the Games will be handed out on Saturday, Feb. 7:

• Alpine skiing (men's downhill)
• Cross country skiing (women's 10k + 10k skiathlon)
• Ski jumping (women's NH individual)
• Snowboard (men's big air)
• Speed skating (women's 3000m)

For more details on the Olympic schedule, click here.

American star Lindsay Vonn participated in an official Olympic training event for Women's downhill skiing on Friday, hitting the slopes at the Winter Games for the first time after rupturing her left ACL when she crashed in a World Cup race in the Swiss Alps a week ago.

Friday's run was the first official downhill training to take place ahead of the Games, after an event scheduled for Thursday was canceled due to the weather.

Vonn completed the run without any apparent issues. Her first competitive Olympic event, the women's downhill, is scheduled for Sunday.

Read more about Vonn's first run in Milan here.

An animal most people have never heard of — the stoat — is the mascot for the 2026 Winter Olympic Games. 

Drawings of Tina the stoat, the Olympic mascot, and her brother Milo, the Paralympic mascot, were designed by students of the Istituto Comprensivo of Taverna, according to the Olympics. The adorable mascots embody "the Italian spirit that inspires them."

Tina and Milo are joined by six snowdrop flowers that the Olympics called "The Flo."

Read more about Tina and Milo here.

The 2026 Winter Olympics, officially the XXV Winter Olympic Games, will be co-hosted by Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo in northern Italy. It is the first Olympic Games to be officially co-hosted by two cities.

Milan will primarily host the ice events, while the remaining events be hosted in clusters around Cortina and the Valtellina and Fiemme valleys. Milan and Cortina are about 250 miles apart by road, nearly a five-hour drive.

Italy first hosted the Winter Olympics in 1956 in Cortina d'Ampezzo, followed by the 2006 Games in Turin. The country has also hosted the Summer Olympics once, in Rome in 1960.

The first Winter Olympics were held in 1924 in Chamonix, France

The 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics will run from Feb. 6 to Feb. 22, although a few events are being held before the official opening day. 

The Games will showcase 116 events on ice and snow, in eight sports and 16 disciplines, including alpine skiing, figure skating, ice hockey, and the debut of ski mountaineering, known as skimo.

The Paralympics will take place the following month, from March 6 to March 15.

The 2026 Winter Olympics opening ceremony will be broadcast in the U.S. on NBC. It will be streamed on Peacock and NBCOlympics.com at 2 p.m. ET. It will last about three hours.

The network says an enhanced encore presentation of the opening ceremony will be broadcast on NBC at 8 p.m. ET.

Read more here.