Swimming at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Qualification

Event	Location	Date	Vacancies	Qualified
2008 Open Water World Championships[9]	Seville	May 3–4, 2008	10	Vladimir Dyatchin David Davies Thomas Lurz Maarten van der Weijden Evgeny Drattsev Ky Hurst Mark Warkentin Valerio Cleri Spyridon Gianniotis Brian Ryckeman
			Continental Representation* 5**	Gilles Rondy Luis Escobar Mohamed El Zanaty Saleh Mohammad
			Host Nation= 1	Xin Tong
Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier[10]	Beijing	May 31 - Jun 1, 2008	9	Petar Stoychev Csaba Gercsák Rostislav Vitek Chad Ho Erwin Maldonado Allan do Carmo Damián Blaum Francisco Jose Hervas Arseniy Lavrentyev**
TOTAL			25

* The first eligible finisher from each of the five Continents at the 2008 Open Water World Championship.
** Since Australia was the only Oceanian country at the 2008 OW WC and the country had a qualifier in the top-10, Oceania did not receive any continental berth and the place redistributed to the Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier for allocation.

Event	Location	Date	Vacancies	Qualified
2008 Open Water Swimming World Championships	Seville	May 3–4, 2008	10	Larisa Ilchenko Cassandra Patten Yurema Requena Natalie du Toit Jana Pechanová Poliana Okimoto Angela Maurer Keri Anne Payne Aurélie Muller Ana Marcela Cunha
			Continental Representation* 5**	Edith van Dijk Fang Yanqiao*** Andreina Pinto Melissa Gorman
			Host Nation= 1***
Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier	Beijing	May 31 - Jun 1, 2008	9	Chloe Sutton Martina Grimaldi Marianna Lymperta Nataliya Samorodina Kristel Köbrich Imelda Martinez Eva Berglund Teja Zupan Antonella Bogarin** Daniela Inacio***
TOTAL			25

* The first eligible finisher from each of the five continents at the 2008 Open Water World Championships. Basically the top finisher from each continent that was outside the top-10 finishers, and from a country who did not have a finisher in the top-10.
**Because South Africa was the only African country at the championships and they had Natalie du Toit qualify for the Olympics via her top-10 finish at the 2008 Open Water World Championships, the Africa continental berth was not allocated to the other South African entrant in the race. The entry allocation instead was added to those available for awarding at the Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier.
***The Host Nation allocated entry was only if China did not have someone qualify in another fashion. China's Fang Yanqiao qualified at the 2008 Open Water World Championships via the Asia Continental Representative allocation, and therefore the Host Nation allocated spot became available at the Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier.
****The Olympic committee of Israel did not approve the participation of Daniel Katzir (men) and Olga Berenseva (women) in the Olympic team, as their results were not good enough to make the national Olympic criteria. Their appeals to court against this decision were denied.