49 Fun Facts About 2026

Which team won the World Cup conceding only one goal, beating holders Argentina 1–0 after extra time?

Spain won through Ferran Torres's extra-time goal against ten-man Argentina, and became the first nation to hold the men's and women's world titles at the same time.

Which tropical nation won its first ever Winter Olympic medal, a giant slalom gold, at Milan–Cortina?

Brazil's Lucas Pinheiro Braathen quit ski racing in 2023 while competing for his father's country, came back a year later under his mother's flag, and won the men's giant slalom on 14 February.

Which 1972 mission was the last to take a crew beyond low Earth orbit before Artemis II's April lunar flyby?

Apollo 17 flew in December 1972; Artemis II's four astronauts then broke Apollo 13's distance record, reaching 252,756 miles from Earth.

Which company's June IPO, the largest ever, briefly made Elon Musk the world's first dollar trillionaire?

SpaceX began trading on the Nasdaq on 12 June, and Musk's stake took him past $1 trillion before a share slump dropped him back below it the next month.

Which country won Eurovision for the first time, Dara's 'Bangaranga' sweeping jury and televote in Vienna?

Bulgaria had only returned after a three-year absence, and 'Bangaranga' was the first winner since Portugal in 2017 to take both the jury vote and the televote.

Which Spanish basilica, under construction since 1882, became the world's tallest church with the tower Pope Leo XIV blessed in June?

The Sagrada Família's 172.5-metre Tower of Jesus Christ was blessed 100 years to the day after Antoni Gaudí died of injuries from a Barcelona tram; he lies in the church's crypt.

Which team beat the New England Patriots 29–13 in Super Bowl LX, handing them a record sixth Super Bowl loss?

The Seattle Seahawks' 'Dark Side' defence held the Patriots scoreless for three quarters, and running back Kenneth Walker III was the first at his position named MVP since 1997.

Which team won its first NBA title in 53 years, beating the San Antonio Spurs in five games?

The New York Knicks' last title was in 1973; in Game 4 they overturned a 29-point deficit, the largest comeback in Finals history, before Jalen Brunson's 45 points sealed Game 5.

Which former Mayor of Greater Manchester became Prime Minister in July after Keir Starmer resigned?

Andy Burnham had only returned to the Commons in June, winning the Makerfield by-election, before King Charles III appointed him on 20 July.

Which former chief nursing officer for England became the first woman to be Archbishop of Canterbury?

Sarah Mullally, the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury, was the youngest person to hold England's top nursing post before she left the NHS for full-time ministry in 2004.

Who was World Cup top scorer for the second tournament running, passing Lionel Messi as its all-time leader?

Kylian Mbappé's 10 goals took him to 22, past a record Lionel Messi had taken from Germany's Miroslav Klose earlier in the same tournament; no one else has finished top scorer twice.

Which stadium hosted the World Cup final in July, after Mexico City's Estadio Azteca staged the opening match?

MetLife Stadium in New Jersey closed a 48-team, 104-match tournament with the first World Cup final to include a halftime show, which stretched the break to more than 27 minutes.

Which country, top of the medal table at the previous two Winter Olympics, won a record 41 medals at Milan–Cortina?

Norway's 18 golds were also a record, six of them won by Johannes Høsflot Klæbo, who swept every men's cross-country event; the United States came second with its best ever haul of 12 golds.

Which sport made its Olympic debut at the Milan–Cortina Winter Games, with events at Bormio's Stelvio centre?

Ski mountaineering's sprint sends racers uphill on skis fitted with grippy skins, then up steps on foot with the skis on their backpacks, before they rip the skins off and ski down.

Which team became the first to win three Men's T20 World Cups, beating New Zealand by 96 runs in a home final?

India had lost all three earlier T20 World Cup meetings with New Zealand, then made 255 for 5 in Ahmedabad and became the first team to retain the trophy and the first hosts to win it.

Who won back-to-back Masters, a feat previously managed only by Jack Nicklaus, Nick Faldo and Tiger Woods?

Rory McIlroy held off Scottie Scheffler by a stroke at Augusta a year after completing the career Grand Slam there, taking his major tally to six.

Who retained the Wimbledon men's title, his fifth major, after losing the first set of the final on a tie-break?

Jannik Sinner won three straight sets after the tie-break, in a fortnight when 39-year-old Novak Djokovic played the longest quarter-final in Wimbledon history, 5 hours 15 minutes.

Which north London club ended a 22-year wait for the Premier League title in May?

Arsenal became champions on a night they did not play: Manchester City's 1–1 draw at Bournemouth on 19 May left Mikel Arteta's side out of reach with a game to spare, their first title since the 2003–04 Invincibles.

Which club retained the Champions League, beating the English champions on penalties in Budapest?

Paris Saint-Germain won 4–3 on penalties after a 1–1 draw when the last English kick flew over the bar, becoming only the second club of the Champions League era to retain the trophy, after Real Madrid.

Which sixth-tier club knocked holders Crystal Palace out of the FA Cup from 117 league places below them?

Macclesfield's 2–1 win on 10 January made Palace the first holders beaten by a non-league side since 1909, when the giant-killers were Crystal Palace themselves.

Which team won the Six Nations with its final kick, a Thomas Ramos penalty to beat England 48–46?

France's second straight title came by two table points from Triple Crown winners Ireland, in a championship where Italy beat England for the first time ever.

Which Scottish runner broke Hicham El Guerrouj's 27-year-old mile world record in London in July?

Josh Kerr ran 3:42.66, calling the attempt 'Project 222' for the 222 seconds he needed to beat a mark that had stood since 1999.

Which horse won a second Grand National in three years, carrying top weight of 11st 12lb as 9/2 favourite?

I Am Maximus, trained by Willie Mullins and ridden by Paul Townend, finished second in 2025 between his 2024 and 2026 Aintree victories.

Which American manufacturer joined Formula One as its eleventh team, the first new entrant since Haas in 2016?

Cadillac's entry began as Michael Andretti's bid, which Formula One vetoed until General Motors agreed to build its own engines; the team started on Ferrari power, while Ford returned as Red Bull's engine partner.

Which Paul Thomas Anderson film won six Oscars, including Best Picture and the first ever award for Best Casting?

One Battle After Another, inspired by Thomas Pynchon's novel Vineland, beat Sinners and its record sixteen nominations to Best Picture, and also won Best Director and Best Supporting Actor for Sean Penn.

Which actor won Best Actor for playing twin brothers, only the second Oscar for a dual role after Lee Marvin's?

Michael B. Jordan played the criminal twins Smoke and Stack in Ryan Coogler's Sinners, which arrived with a record sixteen nominations yet won only four Oscars and missed Best Picture.

Which film beat Avengers: Endgame's record with a $360 million opening weekend in the US and Canada?

Spider-Man: Brand New Day took the North American record by under $3 million, yet its $932 million worldwide opening still ranked second to the Avengers film's; its trailer drew a record 718.6 million views in a day.

Which 2026 release became the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time, passing Deadpool & Wolverine?

Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey was the first feature shot entirely on IMAX film cameras: the old ones were too loud for dialogue scenes, so he challenged IMAX to build lighter, quieter models.

Which animated sequel, made for $110 million, was the first release of 2026 to pass $1 billion worldwide?

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie won over audiences, not critics: its reviews were mixed at best, yet filmgoers polled by CinemaScore graded it A-minus.

Which A24 horror film made 20-year-old Kane Parsons the youngest director to open at number one in the US?

Backrooms grew from Kane Parsons's YouTube series and became A24's highest-grossing film, overtaking Marty Supreme.

Which Puerto Rican star headlined the first Super Bowl halftime show performed almost entirely in Spanish?

Bad Bunny's set, with guests Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin, was the first headlined by a Latino solo artist and even included a couple being legally married on stage.

Which London singer won the Grammy for Best New Artist, the first British winner since Dua Lipa in 2019?

Olivia Dean then took four Brit Awards in Manchester, and her Sam Fender duet 'Rein Me In' became the longest-running UK number one in chart history.

Which festival sat out the summer in a planned 'fallow year', its first since 2018, to let Worthy Farm recover?

Glastonbury's organisers rest the Somerset site roughly every five years; 2020 and 2021 were lost to COVID-19, so this was the first planned break in eight years.

Which director completed an EGOT in February when Music by John Williams won the Grammy for Best Music Film?

Steven Spielberg became the 22nd EGOT winner without directing either clincher: the Grammy for Music by John Williams and his 2022 Tony statuette for the musical A Strange Loop both came for producing.

Which song became the first K-pop track to win a Grammy, then the first to win an Oscar?

'Golden' was co-written and sung by Ejae, who trained for about a decade to be a K-pop idol and was turned down; with Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami she sings as the group Huntrix in KPop Demon Hunters.

Which Welsh singer, whose biggest hit sold over 13 million copies, died in July aged 75?

Bonnie Tyler's two biggest 1980s hits, 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' and 'Holding Out for a Hero', were both written by Jim Steinman.

Which Kendrick Lamar and SZA duet won Record of the Year, giving him back-to-back wins in the category?

Luther, named after Luther Vandross and built on his 'If This World Were Mine' duet with Cheryl Lynn, spent 13 weeks at number one in the US.

Which sitting South American president was seized with his first lady in a US military operation on 3 January?

Nicolás Maduro and first lady Cilia Flores were captured in US airstrikes across the north of the country, and Delcy Rodríguez was sworn in as acting president two days later.

Which Tisza Party leader ended Viktor Orbán's 16-year rule in Hungary with a two-thirds majority in April?

Péter Magyar, a former Fidesz member turned MEP, led Tisza to 141 of 199 seats, the largest share any party has won in a free Hungarian election.

Which country swore in Rob Jetten, its youngest ever and first openly gay prime minister, in February?

The Netherlands' Rob Jetten, the D66 leader, formed a minority cabinet after a four-month negotiation that followed the 2025 election.

Who won Peru's presidential runoff in June at her fourth attempt, 26 years after her father's government fell?

Keiko Fujimori had lost the 2011, 2016 and 2021 runoffs, each narrowly, before becoming the first woman directly elected president of Peru; Dina Boluarte had reached the office by succession.

Which party became the largest in the Senedd for the first time, winning 43 of 96 seats in May?

Plaid Cymru's breakthrough came as Labour fell to third with nine seats, and First Minister Eluned Morgan became the first UK government leader to lose her own seat while in office.

Which shipping chokepoint did Iran close when its war with the United States and Israel began on 28 February?

The Strait of Hormuz closure caused the largest supply disruption in the history of the oil market, and a memorandum signed in June to reopen it broke down within weeks.

Which country, Africa's only Spanish-speaking nation, moved its capital from Malabo to Ciudad de la Paz?

Equatorial Guinea's new inland capital, whose name means 'City of Peace', was chosen partly because a 2004 coup attempt raised fears about the old capital's exposure to the sea.

Autumn Durald Arkapaw's work on Sinners made her the first woman to win which Oscar?

Best Cinematography had not even nominated a woman until Rachel Morrison in 2018; collecting her Oscar, Arkapaw asked every woman in the room to stand, saying she would not be there without them.

Which farm animal was documented using a tool for the first time in January, scratching itself with both ends of a broom?

A cow named Veronika, a pet Brown Swiss in Austria, used the bristles on her tough back and the smooth handle on her belly, flexible tool use reported before only in chimpanzees and humans.

What did CERN scientists move by truck for the first time in March, on a short drive near Geneva?

Antimatter, just 92 antiprotons held in a one-tonne portable trap, was driven about five miles to show it could one day be shipped to other laboratories for study.

What kind of molecule was detected in interstellar space for the first time in July, near the Milky Way's centre?

A sugar called erythrulose, which also occurs in raspberries, was picked up by two radio telescopes, raising hopes that other ingredients of life form between the stars.

Which virus's Bundibugyo strain, with no approved vaccine, triggered a global health emergency in May?

Ebola's Bundibugyo species had no approved vaccine when the emergency was declared, and existing treatments were made for the Zaire species, complicating the response in Congo's Ituri Province and Uganda.