Swimming at the 1996 Summer Olympics – Men's 50 metre freestyle
The men's 50 metre freestyle event at the 1996 Summer Olympics took place on 25 July at the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center in Atlanta, United States.
Records
Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.Competition format
The competition consisted of two rounds: heats and finals. The swimmers with the best 8 times in the heats advanced to final A, where they competed for the top 8 places. The swimmers with the next 8 times in the heats swam in final B, for ninth through the sixteenth place. Swim-offs were used as necessary to determine advancement.Results
Heats
Rule: The eight fastest swimmers advance to final A, while the next eight to final B.| Rank | Heat | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
| 1 | 9 | 4 | Alexander Popov | 22.22 | Q | |
| 2 | 8 | 4 | Gary Hall, Jr. | 22.36 | Q | |
| 3 | 7 | 1 | Jiang Chengji | 22.55 | Q, AS | |
| 4 | 8 | 2 | Brendon Dedekind | 22.60 | Q | |
| 5 | 6 | 1 | Ricardo Busquets | 22.61 | Q, NR | |
| 6 | 9 | 5 | David Fox | 22.64 | Q | |
| 7 | 7 | 3 | Bengt Zikarsky | 22.68 | ||
| 7 | 7 | 8 | Francisco Sánchez | 22.68 | , NR | |
| 7 | 8 | 5 | Fernando Scherer | 22.68 | ||
| 10 | 8 | 6 | Mark Foster | 22.73 | q | |
| 11 | 9 | 8 | Allan Murray | 22.75 | q, NR | |
| 12 | 8 | 1 | Yuriy Vlasov | 22.77 | q | |
| 13 | 9 | 2 | Pieter van den Hoogenband | 22.82 | q | |
| 14 | 8 | 3 | Christophe Kalfayan | 22.83 | q | |
| 15 | 7 | 6 | René Gusperti | 22.85 | q | |
| 16 | 9 | 3 | Gustavo Borges | 22.86 | q | |
| 17 | 7 | 2 | Pavlo Khnykin | 22.91 | ||
| 18 | 7 | 7 | Raimundas Mažuolis | 22.98 | ||
| 18 | 9 | 6 | Chris Fydler | 22.98 | ||
| 20 | 8 | 7 | Vladimir Predkin | 23.03 | ||
| 21 | 7 | 5 | Alexander Lüderitz | 23.06 | ||
| 22 | 9 | 1 | Aleh Rukhlevich | 23.12 | ||
| 23 | 7 | 4 | José Meolans | 23.21 | ||
| 24 | 9 | 7 | Yoav Bruck | 23.22 | ||
| 25 | 6 | 4 | Felipe Delgado | 23.26 | ||
| 26 | 6 | 2 | Sergey Borisenko | 23.29 | ||
| 26 | 6 | 8 | Indrek Sei | 23.29 | NR | |
| 28 | 6 | 7 | Bartosz Kizierowski | 23.34 | ||
| 29 | 5 | 5 | Sion Brinn | 23.35 | NR | |
| 30 | 6 | 6 | Juan Benavides | 23.36 | ||
| 31 | 5 | 8 | Stavros Michaelides | 23.37 | ||
| 32 | 5 | 6 | Enrico Linscheer | 23.45 | ||
| 33 | 6 | 3 | Pär Lindström | 23.47 | ||
| 34 | 6 | 5 | Georgios Giziotis | 23.56 | ||
| 35 | 4 | 8 | Yukihiro Matsushita | 23.60 | ||
| 36 | 4 | 4 | Salim Iles | 23.61 | NR | |
| 36 | 4 | 5 | Janne Blomqvist | 23.61 | ||
| 36 | 8 | 8 | Dzmitry Kalinouski | 23.61 | ||
| 39 | 5 | 4 | Hugues Legault | 23.63 | ||
| 40 | 3 | 3 | Nicholas Tongue | 23.73 | ||
| 40 | 5 | 1 | Paulo Trindade | 23.73 | ||
| 42 | 3 | 4 | Arthur Li Kai Yien | 23.77 | ||
| 43 | 3 | 5 | Maxim Cazmirciuc | 23.78 | ||
| 44 | 5 | 7 | Richard Sam Bera | 23.80 | ||
| 45 | 4 | 3 | Ravil Nachaev | 23.93 | ||
| 46 | 3 | 6 | Darrick Bollinger | 23.97 | ||
| 47 | 4 | 6 | Tamer Hamed | 24.02 | ||
| 48 | 5 | 3 | Nicholas O'Hare | 24.03 | ||
| 49 | 4 | 7 | Sebastian Xavier | 24.15 | ||
| 50 | 4 | 2 | Alen Lončar | 24.17 | ||
| 51 | 3 | 2 | Kaan Berberoğlu | 24.37 | ||
| 52 | 4 | 1 | Vitaly Vasilyev | 24.54 | ||
| 53 | 2 | 6 | Khemo Rivera | 24.62 | NR | |
| 54 | 2 | 3 | Howard Hinds | 24.63 | ||
| 55 | 3 | 1 | Tamás Kerékjártó | 24.67 | ||
| 56 | 2 | 5 | Huang Chih-yung | 24.89 | ||
| 57 | 2 | 2 | Alfredo Carrillo | 24.91 | ||
| 58 | 3 | 8 | Sng Ju Wei | 25.04 | ||
| 59 | 3 | 7 | Emin Guliyev | 25.23 | ||
| 60 | 1 | 4 | Woodrow Lawrence | 27.88 | ||
| 61 | 1 | 5 | Moosa Nazim | 28.37 | ||
| 62 | 1 | 3 | René Makosso | 30.00 | ||
| 63 | 2 | 1 | Michael Collier | 34.21 | ||
| 5 | 2 | Alexandru Ioanovici | ||||
| 2 | 4 | Musa Bakare |