The women's marathon swimming over a distance of 10 kilometres at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro took place on 15 August at Fort Copacabana.

[1] Sharon van Rouwendaal of Netherlands won the gold medal, Rachele Bruni of Italy was runner-up, and Poliana Okimoto of Brazil finished third.

The original silver medalist was Aurelie Muller of France, who managed to overcome Bruni in the last second of the race.

However, a video replay showed Muller forcibly holding Bruni down with her right arm while trying to touch the finishing board, thus being disqualified from the race.

[2] The women's 10 km open water marathon at the 2016 Olympics featured a field of 26 swimmers:[3] Unlike all of the other swimming events in the pool, the men's and women's marathon 10 kilometre races are held in open water.