Entry routes for the Abbott World Marathon Majors.

The Majors are the world's most prestigious city marathons — London, Boston, Berlin, Chicago, New York, Tokyo, and Sydney. Finishing all of them earns the Six Star (now Seven Star) medal, which is why demand for entry vastly exceeds places at every one.

A ballot (lottery) uses organiser-defined selection rules — you apply during a window and wait for the result, with no guaranteed place. A qualifier route (such as Boston's standards or London's Good for Age) requires an eligible time and can also have allocation or application rules. Always check the current organiser criteria.

It depends on the race and on you: qualifier routes require an eligible time and may still have allocation rules, charities choose and confirm their own runners, official tour packages can include an entry allocation with travel, and ballots are chance-based. The matrix shows tracked route families and which have a current verified-open route — Racera links to official pages and never sells or guarantees entry.

Sometimes — depending on the race, provider availability, and current official rules. A race may have charity, tour-package, transfer, or waitlist routes after its ballot closes. Racera marks the verification state of tracked routes, and Plan B ranks comparable races only when a route is currently verified as open.