Current season, competition or edition: 2023 BWF World Championships | |
Formerly | IBF World Championships |
---|---|
Sport | Badminton |
Founded | 1977 |
Country | BWF member nations |
The BWF World Championships, aka the World Badminton Championships, is a badminton tournament organized by the Badminton World Federation.[1] It's the most prestigious badminton competition, offering the most ranking points, along with the Summer Olympics badminton events introduced in 1992.[2] The winners of the tournament are World Champions of the sport and are awarded a gold medal.[3]
The tournament started in 1977 and was held once every three years until 1983. However, the International Badminton Federation faced difficulty in hosting the first two events as the World Badminton Federation, which later merged with the IBF to form one badminton federation, hosted the same tournament a year after the IBF World Championships with the same goals.
Since 1985, the tournament became biennial and played once every two years until 2005. Starting 2006, the tournament was changed to an annual event on the BWF calendar. The tournament is not held during the Summer Olympics years to avoid schedule conflicts.