The 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships were held in Adelaide, Australia from November 14 to 23. Reigning 2024 Olympic champions David Ahman & Jonatan Hellvig also emerged as the 2025 men’s world champions in beach volleyball. At 23 and 24, respectively, they were the youngest world champs ever. In a sensational all-Swedish World Championship gold medal showdown, they persevered through two sets of their even younger compatriots Jacob Holting Nilsson & Elmer Andersson’s strong resistance to triumph with the crown.
It was Sweden’s first-ever title in the history of the World Championships in either gender. The two medals the northern European country picked up enriched its World Championship collection to a total of three, after Ahman & Hellvig’s silver at Tlaxcala 2023. In addition, Sweden became only the second country in history to have two teams playing against one another in a World Championship final. Only Brazil had achieved such an exploit in the past, once in men’s competition and twice on the women’s side.
Meanwhile, Teo Rotar & Arnaud Gauthier-Rat also made history in Adelaide, winning France’s first ever World Championship medal in either gender.
Ahman & Hellvig’s story from the Paris 2024 Olympics repeated in Australia, and after losing two of their three matches in the pool stage of the tournament, they once again found their way to the top of the podium. The third-seeded Swedes cruised through the playoffs without dropping a single set. In a remake of the Olympic final, they mastered a 2-0 (21-10, 21-14) semifinal shutout of Germany’s Nils Ehlers & Clemens Wickler. Then, in a spectacular final, Ahman & Hellvig managed a 2-0 (25-23, 21-19) victory over 20-year-old Holting Nilsson and 19-year-old Andersson, seeded seventh.
“Of course, we’ve always dreamt of winning a World Championship title. We didn’t believe we would make it this time as I’ve been injured, but we just kept playing better and better every single game and now we are here! It’s crazy!” an elated Ahman told VBTV after the gold medal showdown.
“It was just unbelievable and so cool that we had two Swedish teams in the final. And I’m just so proud of our team, of our coaches and, of course, of Jacob and Elmer as well!” Hellvig added.
In their semifinal, Holting Nilsson & Andersson got back at Rotar & Gauthier-Rat for the three-set loss they suffered in the pool stage of the tournament and beat them in straight sets, 2-0 (21-18, 21-17), to become the youngest team ever to compete in a World Championship final.
Rotar & Gauthier-Rat, seeded 18th, reached the last four with a series of six consecutive victories, five of which were won in the tie-breakers. After suffering their first loss of the tournament in the semis, the Frenchmen secured the historic medal by hammering out a 2-0 (21-15, 21-15) sweep of the third-place playoff against Ehlers & Wickler.
A total of 48 teams from 28 different federations and all five continental confederations took part in the men’s World Championship in Australia. They played in a total of 108 matches.
Click here for the official 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship website.
