| Date | 3 – 7 December 1956 — 08:00-16:00 | |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Olympic | |
| Location | West Melbourne Stadium, Melbourne, Victoria | |
| Participants | 42 from 7 countries | |
| Format | Six-person teams. Each gymnast to perform a compulsory and an optional exercise on all six apparatuses. Top five scores per team on each of the 12 exercises count towards the team score. | |
This was a relatively close contest between the Soviet Union and Japan. The Soviets were the defending champions and were led by Viktor Chukarin, individual all-around gold medalist in both 1952 and 1956, and had comfortably defeated the Japanese at the 1954 World Championships. The Soviets prevailed over Japan by slightly less than two points, but this would be the last Olympic team victory by the Soviet men until the 1980 Olympics, as Japan would win the team gold medal at the next five Olympics.
URS
JPN
FIN
TCH
GER
USA
AUS