Swimming at the 1968 Summer Olympics – Men's 400 metre individual medley
The men's 400 metre individual medley event at the 1968 Summer Olympics took place on 22–23 October. This swimming event used medley swimming. Because an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of eight lengths of the pool. The first two lengths were swum using the butterfly stroke, the second pair with the backstroke, the third pair of lengths in breaststroke, and the final two were freestyle. Unlike other events using freestyle, swimmers could not use butterfly, backstroke, or breaststroke for the freestyle leg; most swimmers use the front crawl in freestyle events.Medalists
Results
Heats
Heat 1
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Note |
| 1 | Andrey Dunayev | | 5:01.9 | |
| 2 | Martyn Woodroffe | | 5:03.9 | |
| 3 | Eduardo Alanís | | 5:14.9 | |
| 4 | Jacek Krawczyk | | 5:15.1 | |
| 5 | José Martínez | | | DQ |
Heat 2
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Note |
| 1 | Greg Buckingham | | 4:57.3 | |
| 2 | Rafael Hernández | | 5:01.1 | |
| 3 | Hans Ljungberg | | 5:06.1 | |
| 4 | Vladimir Kravchenko | | 5:08.7 | |
| 5 | Tomas Becerra | | 5:09.7 | |
| 6 | Miguel Torres | | 5:12.7 | |
| 7 | Gudmunður Gíslason | | 5:20.2 | |
| 8 | Raúl Villagómez | | 5:24.7 | |
Heat 3
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Note |
| 1 | Charlie Hickcox | | 4:56.2 | |
| 2 | Reinhard Merkel | | 5:00.6 | |
| 3 | Bernhard Mock | | 5:07.1 | |
| 4 | Péter Lázár | | 5:10.6 | |
| 5 | Angel Chakarov | | 5:10.9 | |
| 6 | Ken Campbell | | 5:19.6 | |
| 7 | Gershon Shefa | | 5:22.6 | |
| 8 | Lee Tong-shing | | 5:50.0 | |
Heat 4
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Note |
| 1 | Mike Holthaus | | 5:00.8 | |
| 2 | George Smith | | 5:04.4 | |
| 3 | Yulyan Rusev | | 5:07.0 | |
| 4 | Lars Kraus Jensen | | 5:12.7 | |
| 5 | Zbigniew Pacelt | | 5:18.6 | |
| 6 | Raymond Terrell | | 5:19.5 | |
| 7 | Francisco Ramis | | 5:30.9 | |
| 8 | Antonio Cruz | | 5:31.1 | |
Heat 5
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Note |
| 1 | Gary Hall | | 4:56.2 | |
| 2 | Sandy Gilchrist | | 4:57.5 | |
| 3 | Karl Byrom | | 5:11.9 | |
| 4 | Michele D'Oppido | | 5:16.4 | |
| 5 | Jacques Henrard | | 5:17.0 | |
| 6 | Olle Ferm | | 5:18.9 | |
Final
| Rank | Athlete | Country | Time | Notes |
| Charlie Hickcox | | 4:48.4 | |
| Gary Hall, Sr. | | 4:48.7 | |
| Michael Holthaus | | 4:51.4 | |
| 4 | Greg Buckingham | | 4:51.4 | |
| 5 | Sandy Gilchrist | | 4:56.7 | |
| 6 | Reinhard Merkel | | 4:59.8 | |
| 7 | Andrey Dunayev | | 5:00.3 | |
| 8 | Rafael Hernández | | 5:04.3 | |
