Marathon Entry Top 8 · Rev
Marathon Registration Dates to Know for Boston, Sydney, Grandma's and New York
Eight races, four continents, and not one of them decided at the start line. The Boston window opens on 14 September and shuts on the 18th.
The 2027 Boston Marathon is run on 19 April. Registration for it closes on 18 September 2026 — seven months before anyone stands in Hopkinton.
That is the part the search results bury: for the races people actually want, the decision point is not race day but a window of a few days, announced quietly, often a year out. Some of those windows are random draws.
One of them emptied in twelve hours. Here is where the doors stand.
1Boston 2027: qualifier registration 14–18 September, $260 entry
Qualifier registration for the 2027 race runs 14–18 September 2026. Entry is $260. The standards are banded by age and gender — 2:55:00 for men 18–34, 3:25:00 for women and non-binary runners in the same band, on a certified net time — and clearing one buys only the right to apply.
The B.A.A.
puts it in writing: the field is capped, and if submissions exceed it, the fastest within each age and gender group are taken. About 1,000 of those left under the cutoff go into a separate random selection. New from this edition, net-downhill courses are corrected: +5:00 for a drop of 1,500–2,999 feet, +10:00 for 3,000–5,999, and nothing over 6,000 feet counts at all.
The second door is the official charity program, where invitational places carry fundraising pledges averaging around $15,000.
Boston MarathonMon, April 19, 2027 · D-155 · Boston, United StatesSee race details
2Sydney 2027 ballot opens 29 September and closes 19 October
The general ballot for the 29 August 2027 race opens 29 September 2026 at 10:00 AEST and closes 19 October at 10:00 AEDT. It is a random draw, not a queue; results go out by email in late October. Entry is A$280.
Sydney is the seventh Abbott World Marathon Major and the first in Australia, and the 2025 edition finished 32,963 runners from 117 countries — which is why a ballot exists at all. Two routes skip it: charity places and official travel packages, both confirmed rather than drawn. A High Performance Program allocates places on time standards; applicants who miss them stay in the general ballot.
Sydney MarathonSun, August 29, 2027 · D-287 · Sydney, AustraliaSee race details
3Grandma's 2027 opens 1 October; the 2026 race sold out in 12 hours
Entries open 1 October 2026 at 7:00 p.m. Central.
The 2026 marathon sold out in twelve hours, which makes the opening hour the entire strategy. The first tier is $155 and holds from 1 to 15 October; the organisers say the price rises afterwards without publishing the next number. The course runs point to point along Lake Superior into Duluth, 740 feet at the start down to 610 at the finish — a net 130-foot descent, well under any correction threshold.
The 51st running is 19 June 2027.
Grandma's MarathonSat, June 19, 2027 · D-216 · Duluth, United StatesSee race details
4Marine Corps Marathon: March lottery, then open entry from 6 April
Registration has been open since 6 April 2026 for the 25 October race, with no closing date posted. It is the remainder of a lottery that ran 20–26 March, free to enter, with results emailed on the 27th. Three groups register ahead of that draw: the Runners Club for anyone with five or more finishes, active-duty military, and Rush registration.
Entry is $240. The race pays no prize money, and the organisers describe it as the largest marathon in the world without any — the reason a field this big is still open six weeks out.
Marine Corps MarathonOctober 2027 · expected · Arlington, United StatesSee race details
5Amsterdam 2026 — €145 entry, charity places once it sells out
The 18 October 2026 race has been taking entries since 20 December 2025. The full and half sold out in the previous edition, and once that happens the only remaining route is the KWF charity allocation; official tour packages are the other. Entry is €145 for the marathon and €43.50 for the half.
Start and finish sit inside the Olympic Stadium — out of the track, around the city, back onto the same track. The high point of the course is 10 metres above sea level and does not arrive until 37 km.
Amsterdam MarathonSun, October 31, 2027 · D-350 · Amsterdam, NetherlandsSee race details
6Gold Coast 2027: entries open early December 2026, fee TBC
The official 2027 event page lists entries opening in early December 2026, with the marathon fee still TBC. It does not give an exact opening day or a closing date. For context, the organisers' 2026 Good for Age programme listed standard entry fees of A$235 for the marathon and A$180 for the half; these are previous-edition figures, not 2027 prices.
The 2027 marathon is scheduled for Sunday 4 July, within the 3–4 July event weekend.
Gold Coast MarathonSun, July 4, 2027 · D-231 · Gold Coast, AustraliaSee race details
7Beppu-Oita 2027 — qualifying times by category, ¥18,000 entry
Registration opened 28 August 2026 for the 7 February 2027 race, and the category decides the door. Category 2 requires a sub-2:55:00, Category 3 a sub-2:59:59, both set on an AAF- or AIMS-certified course since 1 January 2023, with the certificate emailed in within a week of applying. Those two are first-come in principle, though the organisers reserve the right to convert to a draw if applications run past expectations.
Category 4 is a lottery from the outset. Entry is ¥18,000, and the race holds a World Athletics Elite label.
Beppu-Ōita MarathonSun, February 7, 2027 · D-84 · Oita, JapanSee race details
8New York: four entry routes after the February lottery closed
The draw for the 1 November 2026 race ran 4–25 February 2026 and is finished. Entry is $315. Four standing routes remain for the next edition: a time qualifier, an official charity, an international tour operator package, and 9+1 — nine NYRR races plus one volunteer shift in the preceding year.
The time standard is not a bypass by itself. Hit it at a designated NYRR race and entry is guaranteed; hit it anywhere else and you apply for a limited pool, fastest first. 59,226 runners finished in 2025, which is the arithmetic underneath every one of those doors.
New York City MarathonSun, November 7, 2027 · D-357 · New York City, United StatesSee race details
Editor's pick
The instinct is to chase the draws, and for most runners that is the wrong bet. Two of these eight can be entered today with no lottery and no time standard: Marine Corps, open since April, and Amsterdam, if the charity allocation still holds. If you want a date rather than an email, take one of those.
Boston and Beppu-Oita are the opposite trade — they reward a time already on record, not a lucky Tuesday. And if the only goal is to stand on a start line in 2027, set an alarm for 1 October, because Grandma’s settles in twelve hours what the others stretch over months.
In date order the next gates are Boston on 14–18 September, the Sydney ballot from 29 September to 19 October, Grandma’s on 1 October, and Gold Coast in early December 2026. Marine Corps, Amsterdam and Beppu-Oita are open now; New York reopens in February.
Entry period · Accommodation
| Races | Itinerary | Entry period | INFO. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston Marathon | Mon, April 19, 2027 | Mon, September 14, 2026 ~ Fri, September 18, 2026 | Accommodation · See race details |
| Sydney Marathon | Sun, August 29, 2027 | Tue, September 29, 2026 ~ Mon, October 19, 2026 | Accommodation · See race details |
| Grandma's Marathon | Sat, June 19, 2027 | Thu, October 1, 2026 ~ Sat, May 1, 2027 | Accommodation · See race details |
| Marine Corps Marathon | October 2027 · expected | Not yet open | Accommodation · See race details |
| Amsterdam Marathon | Sun, October 31, 2027 | Sat, December 19, 2026 ~ — | Accommodation · See race details |
| Gold Coast Marathon | Sun, July 4, 2027 | Tue, December 1, 2026 ~ Sat, July 3, 2027 | Accommodation · See race details |
| Beppu-Ōita Marathon | Sun, February 7, 2027 | Fri, August 28, 2026 ~ Thu, September 10, 2026 | Accommodation · See race details |
| New York City Marathon | Sun, November 7, 2027 | Not yet open | Accommodation · See race details |
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