Gwangju 2025 Para Worlds: Sheetal Devi's First Title, China's Six Golds

Two weeks after the able-bodied world championships, the Gwangju International Archery Center hosted the 2025 World Para Archery Championships from 22 to 28 September 2025. A total of 239 athletes from 47 countries competed across seventeen events.

China topped the medal table with six gold medals and twelve in total. India was second with two golds and five medals, and Mongolia also won two golds.

Standout performances

• Sheetal Devi (India) won her first world title in the women's compound open, beating Türkiye's Öznur Cüre Girdi, the reigning world and Paralympic champion, in the final. A year earlier Devi had won Paralympic bronze in Paris at the age of 17.
• Wu Chunyan (China) won an unprecedented fourth recurve women's world title, beating team-mate Gao Zihan in straight sets as China swept the recurve podium.
• Zhang Tianxin (China) was the only triple gold medallist of the championships, including the individual W1 title over Paralympic champion Jason Tabansky.
• Kim Ok-geum (South Korea), aged 65, won her first world gold on home soil in the women's doubles with Lee Eun-hee.
• Christos Misos won Cyprus's first gold medal at a World Para Archery Championships.
• Mongolia won two team golds, finishing third in the table ahead of Türkiye, Korea, Czechia, Italy and the United States.

Recognition

Sheetal Devi was named Para Archer of the Year at the 2025 World Archery Awards in March 2026, the second major honour of a season that marked her out as the sport's most prominent young para athlete.

Why it matters

Para archery classifications (W1, compound open, recurve open) mirror the equipment used in Olympic archery, so results here track the same technical trends. Gwangju also confirmed India's rapid rise in compound archery, which extended across able-bodied and para competition in 2025 and 2026.