The Games were held for 15 days from 5 to 20 October 1951 in Alexandria, Egypt, where 734 athletes (all men) from 10 countries participated.

The following is a list of nations that participated in the 1951 Mediterranean Games: The inaugural Mediterranean Games sports program featured 13 sports encompassing 91 men-only events.

The rankings sort by the number of gold medals earned by a country.

Equal ranking is given and they are listed alphabetically if after the above, countries are still tied.

This follows the system used by the IOC, IAAF and BBC.