Among other achievements, Mostafa Mansour was the nation's first competitor in sprint canoeing while fencer Shaimaa El-Gammal became the first Egyptian female to appear in four editions of the Olympics.

Tamer Bayoumi, a 2004 Olympic bronze medalist and the nation's most successful taekwondo practitioner at the 2012 Games, was chosen to carry Egypt's flag at the closing ceremony.

Middleweight boxer Mohamed Hikal and skeet shooter Mostafa Hamdy also made a fourth appearance at the Games, while Gaber, Mesbah, and six other athletes made their third Olympic appearance: discus thrower Omar Ahmed El Ghazaly, modern pentathlete Aya Medany, table tennis player El-sayed Lashin, Greco-Roman wrestlers Ashraf El-Gharably and Mohamed Abdelfatah, and judoka Islam El Shehaby.

[10] Nada Kamel, who had earned seven medals at the 2011 Pan Arab Games,[11] won the women's event at the 2012 African Championships[12] and entered the individual tournament.

[16] In the 100 m, he drew the same heat as world record-holder and defending Olympic champion Usain Bolt of Jamaica and finished fourth, which was insufficient to advance.

He was placed in the same heat as David Rudisha of Kenya, the world-record holder and upcoming gold medalist, and finished eighth out of nine competitors, failing to reach the final.

Omar Ahmed El Ghazaly, in the discus, was the most experienced of the quartet, with senior international medals going back to bronze at the 2002 African Championships in Athletics,[19] in addition to past Olympic appearances in 2004 and 2008.

[28] Mohamed Fathalla Difallah, who had come in fourth at the 2011 All-Africa Games,[25] was 37th out of 41 competitors in the qualifying round of the long jump in London, with a distance of 7.08 meters, and did not advance to the final.

[30] In the women's singles, she lost to Pi Hongyan of France and Chloe Magee of Ireland, finished in the bottom of her group, and was eliminated from the tournament.

[32] The only Egyptian to win a bout in London was Hesham Yehia, in the flyweight division, who defeated Benson Gicharu of Kenya before losing to Jasurbek Latipov of Uzbekistan in the round of 16.

[36] Mohamed Ramadan and Eslam El-Gendy lost their first bouts to eventual silver medalist Han Soon-Chul of South Korea and Gyula Káté of Hungary in the lightweight and light welterweight events respectively.

In the months leading up to the Olympics, he trained full-time in the Netherlands[30] and won a silver medal in the team jumping event at the 2011 Pan Arab Games.

[43] The final competitors, Mona Hassanein in the women's épée and Mannad Zeid in the men's sabre, won an African qualifier to earn their spots.

To qualify for the final he defeated American Miles Chamley-Watson, Germany's Peter Joppich, Italy's Andrea Cassarà, and South Korea's Choi Byung-Chul,[48] and became the first African to win an Olympic fencing medal.

[30] In the tournament, Egypt was drawn into Group C. It lost its first match against Brazil 3–2, but tied New Zealand 1–1 and defeated Belarus 3–1 to advance to the knockout stage.

Mohamed El-Saharty, the lone male, was invited to London as the highest-ranked African in the individual all-around at the 2011 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships.

[73] He won his opening match against Osman Murillo Segura of Costa Rica before being defeated by France's Ugo Legrand, an eventual bronze medalist.

[76] Hesham Mesbah, who was Egypt's only medalist at the 2008 Summer Olympics,[77] returned to the 90 kg division by being ranked 13th in the world,[73] but was eliminated his first match, against Timur Bolat of Kazakhstan.

[78] Islam El Shehaby had participated in the 2004 and 2008 Summer Olympics and had international judo titles in the +100 kg division as far back as the 1999 Pan Arab Games.

American-born Farida Osman, the woman, was the youngest member of the 2012 national delegation and qualified for the Games based on having made the Olympic Standard Time in the 50-metre freestyle.

[110] Mazen Metwaly, a Saudi-born Egyptian training and studying at Southern Illinois University Carbondale,[111] made the team at an Olympic qualifier in Setúbal, Portugal in June 2012, the second of his two opportunities (his first having been the 2011 World Championships).

The four singles competitors, Omar Assar, El-sayed Lashin, Nadeen El-Dawlatly, and Dina Meshref, all qualified based on their achievements at the 2011 All-Africa Games.

[128] Key: BM = Bronze medal match; N/A = Round not applicable for the event; Bye = Athlete not required to compete in round Four Egyptian taekwondo practitioners, two men and two women, qualified for the Olympics, all of whom finished first at the African Qualification tournament, except for Abdelrahman Ossama in the men's 80 kg class, who was second behind Morocco's Issam Chernoubi.

In the 58 kg class he defeated Nursultan Mamayev of Kazakhstan in the round of 16 before losing in sudden death to Lee Dae-Hoon of South Korea, the eventual silver medalist, in the quarterfinals.

[130] The only other Egyptian to win a match was Hedaya Malak, in the women's 57 kg, who overcame Robin Cheong of New Zealand before being defeated by Marlène Harnois of France, an eventual bronze medalist.

[131] In his first bout, Ossama lost to Tommy Mollet of the Netherlands in sudden death,[132] while Seham El-Sawalhy, the 2010 and 2012 African champion,[133] was eliminated by Sweden's Elin Johansson in the round of 16 of the women's 67 kg class.

[134] Key: Bye = Athlete not required to compete in round; SDP = Decision by sudden death point Five Egyptian men, Ahmed Saad, Mohamed Abdelbaki, Ibrahim Ramadan, Ragab Abdelhay, and Tarek Yehia, qualified for the Olympic weightlifting tournament by ranking seventh overall after the 2010 and 2011 World Weightlifting Championships,[135] and three women, Esmat Mansour, Abeer Abdelrahman, and Nahla Ramadan, by ranking fourteenth.

In the men's freestyle tournament, only Hassan Madany in the 60 kg class defeated an opponent, winning his bout against Didier Pais of France in the round of 16 before losing to North Korea's Ri Jong-Myong in the quarterfinals.

[159] The only other Egyptian freestyle wrestler to take part in more than one bout was Ibrahim Farag in the 55 kg class, who lost against eventual silver medalist Vladimer Khinchegashvili of Georgia in the qualification round and Bulgaria's Radoslav Velikov in the repechage.

[168] In women's freestyle wrestling, Rabab Eid qualified for the 55 kg class by coming in second at the African and Oceania qualification tournament, behind Marwa Amri of Tunisia.