04 Feb 2022 By Know Muslim
Almost 3,000 athletes from 91 nations will compete to get their hands on one of 109 gold medals on offer across seven sports.
Although live sport started on Wednesday with mixed doubles curling, the opening ceremony takes place on Friday, marking the official start of the 24th Winter Games.
"The world is turning its eyes to China and China is ready. We will do our best to deliver to the world a streamlined, safe and splendid Games," Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Thursday.
But these are already controversial Olympics, with protests and diplomatic boycotts over alleged human rights abuses, while the Covid-19 pandemic continues to have an impact with strict control measures in place.
Here's everything you need to know.
Beijing is the first city to host both the summer and winter Games, 14 years after it hosted the 2008 summer Olympics.
The event takes place across three clusters. Beijing itself will host the indoor events - curling, speed skating, figure skating and ice hockey - as well as the big air and the opening and closing ceremonies.
Yanqing, located 75km (47 miles) out of Beijing, is the home of the sliding sports - bobsleigh, skeleton and luge - and alpine skiing, while the mountains of Zhangjiakou, 180km (111 miles) away from the Chinese capital, host the freestyle skiing and snowboarding events, ski jumping, biathlon and cross-country.
Many of the venues in Beijing from the 2008 Games have been repurposed, including swimming's Water Cube, which has been renovated to become the home of curling, and the Bird's Nest stadium, which will host the opening and closing ceremonies.
Artificial snow has been used across all venues - although there was some natural snowfall in Zhangjiakou in the week leading up to the Games. It is estimated that 49m gallons
(222.8m litres) of water have been used to produce the fake snow in Yanqing alone.
But that isn't a concern for GB's athletes, with snowboarder Katie Ormerod telling BBC Sport: "I grew up in the UK so it's all artificial snow."
Fifty GB athletes will fly the flag for Team GB in Beijing, with three returning medalists - Izzy Atkin (freestyle skiing), Laura Deas (skeleton) and Eve Muirhead (curling) - among them. And the 2014 ski slopestyle silver medallist Gus Kenworthy is also competing for Britain, after switching from the United States.
The United States have sent a 224-strong team to Beijing, making them the biggest squad at the Games, while 17 nations have sent just one athlete, including India and Ecuador.
Norway, who topped the medal table four years ago in Pyeongchang, are again expected to dominate the cross-country skiing events and will also hope for alpine skiing success through Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, who is favourite in the super-G.
He is also tipped to challenge Switzerland's Beat Feuz in the blue riband men's downhill, while the Norwegian's American girlfriend Mikaela Shiffrin needs one more gold to set a record for the most Olympic wins by an American alpine skier. She has a good chance as she is aiming to compete in all five women's individual events.
Veteran American snowboarder Shaun White is back for a fifth Games, while 49-year-old German speed skater Claudia Pechstein will be competing at her eighth. At the opposite end of the scale, 15-year-old Russian Kamila Valieva is the hot favourite for gold in the women's figure skating.
Valieva is one of the 212 athletes competing under the flag of the Russian Olympic Committee, with Russia still banned from international competition because of doping sanctions.
In figure skating Japan's Hanyu Yuzuru is set to attempt to become the first person to land a quadruple axel in competition as he seeks a third men's title in a row in what promises to be an intriguing duel with American Nathan Chen.
China will be aiming for a good showing at their home Games, with freestyle skier Eileen Gu leading their hopes in three events for a country whose best winter Olympics showing is 11 medals at Vancouver 2010.
Two countries are making their Winter Olympics debuts - Haiti and Saudi Arabia - both in alpine skiing.
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