Enter London Marathon 2023

The London Marathon 2023 will take place on Sunday 23rd April, just six months after the 2022 race.

The ballot opened on Saturday 1st October 2022, the day before the 2022 London Marathon was held. It was open for one week and closed on 9pm BST on Friday 7th October.

The ballot results were announced on Monday 24th October 2022. More than 410,000 people entered the ballot.

If you were successful, congratulations! Now’s the time to pick your marathon training plan. 

You can no longer enter the ballot for 2023’s London Marathon. When the ballot is open you sign up on the event website. You don’t have to pay the entry fee (£49.99, or £47 for club-affiliated runners), but you can and then opt to donate it to charity if you don’t get a place in the race. Those who decide to be charitable get another bite of the apple in a second draw, which allocates another 2,000 places. Those who miss out in that extra draw still get a training top worth £70, so they don’t go home completely empty-handed.

A London Marathon place is relatively cheap. The New York Marathon, for example, costs $358 (£293) for foreigners and $295 (£241) for Americans, and there are even a few 10K and half marathon races in London that cost more than this prestigious marathon.

There is also an international ballot for the London Marathon 2023. If you get a place through that it costs £120 plus a £26 carbon offset fee to take into account extra travel for international participants.

The London Marathon doesn’t give the exact number of places that are allocated by the ballot, but it’s believed to be around 17,000-20,000 of the 40,000 total spots. More than 350,000 entered the ballot for the 2022 race, so you can see straight away the odds aren’t in your favour. 

However, it’s a completely random draw so you have just as good a chance as anyone else – there is no preferential treatment for, say, those who have entered the ballot unsuccessfully in the past. In addition, more than 20,000 people are probably initially successful in the ballot because the organisers will account for the many people who drop out or defer after getting a place.

You can also choose to donate your entry fee even if unsuccessful in the ballot and if you do you are entered into a second ballot that allocates another 2,000 spots to “lucky losers” after the main draw.

Whether you can defer your London Marathon place, and how long for, depends on a number of factors. However, most entrants can defer their place for at least one year.

If you enter via the ballot or through your running club then you can defer your entry for a year using the online participant dashboard. You’ll still need to pay for your place in the following year’s race to secure a spot, and can’t defer for more than one year (with the exception of if you are pregnant or postpartum). International entrants can also defer their place for one year.

Whether you can defer a charity place is up to the charity involved, so you will have to discuss it with them. You can’t defer the place via the London Marathon system.

If you had a place in the London Marathon via Good For Age or Championship entry, which is based on running a qualifying time, you cannot defer your place, unless you are pregnant or postpartum.

The London Marathon made some welcome changes to deferrals for pregnant and postpartum people in 2022. You can now defer for up to three years in this situation, and this goes for those who have a Good For Age or Championship place as well, so you don’t have to run the qualifying time again.

If you strike out in the ballot or miss the window to enter, consider trying to get a charity place for the race. The London Marathon website has a list of charities that have guaranteed spots for the event. Once you find one you’d like to raise money for, head to the charity’s own website to apply for one of its places.

Speedy runners can also get into the race via Good For Age entry. Since 2020 this entry method has provided 6,000 total spots divided evenly between men and women who achieve the age-graded qualifying times. Bear in mind that Good For Age places are allocated on a fastest-first basis so if you’ve just squeaked under the qualifying time it’s worth looking into a charity spot too. 

Good For Age entry to the 2023 London Marathon closed at 5pm on Friday 7th October 2022.

By being extremely quick! And being a member of a running club. Full details will be published on London Marathon’s Championship entry (opens in new tab) webpage by the end of November.

The Virtual London Marathon saw 24,000 runners in 100 countries complete the 2021 marathon within a 24-hour period, logging their efforts in the official app to earn a finisher’s medal and T-shirt.

There was a virtual event in 2022 as well, and it seems set to be a part of the London Marathon in future. If you didn’t get a ballot place, you will be offered the chance to enter the virtual event for £30 and placed in a draw to win one of 24 places in the 2024 London Marathon.