NYC Marathon 2026 Hits All Five Boroughs on Nov. 1, Marking the Course's 50th Year

New York Road Runners (NYRR) says the TCS New York City Marathon takes place this Sunday, November 1, with nearly 60,000 marathoners from across the globe expected to run. NYRR opened the week with the line "it's officially the best week of the year in NYC."

This year is the 50th anniversary of the five-borough course, which takes in Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, the Bronx and Manhattan. To mark the milestone, NYRR held events in all five boroughs rather than in a single location.

The first of them was the Kids Kickoff, held over the weekend of October 25 for young runners in the Rising NYRR youth program. More than 4,500 kids took part, with a kickoff event in each of the five boroughs. The Manhattan event was in Central Park, where the marathoners will run on Sunday.

According to NYRR, youth ambassadors from Rising New York Road Runners handled part of the day themselves. They served as race announcers and sang the national anthem, helping run the event while also running in it.

NYRR is also looking past marathon weekend. The United Airlines NYC Half returns on Sunday, March 21, 2027. The 13.1-mile race starts in Brooklyn, crosses the Brooklyn Bridge, runs along FDR Drive, and passes through Times Square, which NYRR notes is closed to traffic only twice a year, before finishing in Central Park. Entry runs on a drawing system. Applications for the non-guaranteed drawing and for guaranteed entry are open from October 21 to November 11, 2026, and the drawing is on November 18. The window for non-NYRR time qualifiers ran October 21 to 28.

For readers in Japan following the race from afar, this year's edition is a notable one: the five-borough route is 50 years old. Race-day details and course information are on NYRR's own channels.