Simone Biles’s Tattoos and Their Meanings

Simone Biles has been quite busy ever since she dominated her very first Olympics back in 2016. The athlete quickly became a household name seven years ago after winning five medals (four gold, one bronze) during the big event, and one thing she made sure to do to commemorate her experience was get her very first tattoo. A year after competing, Biles’s close friend Jake Miller documented her experience getting her first piece of ink via Instagram, and the athlete, of course, got a design of the Olympic rings in black ink.

More recently, she’s dominated at the Paris 2024 Olympics, got married in April 2023 to Jonathan Owens in Mexico, and built her dream home. And in the moments between all of that, she’s continued to add more body art to her collection — quietly, that is. Historically, Biles doesn’t make a very big show of getting a new tattoo. She got the phrase “And still I rise” back in 2021 but never shared its exact significance to her and sometime in the last year, she added two small butterflies to the back of her hand. There are a handful of other meaningful designs where those came from.

To get a look at all of Biles’s tattoos and their meanings, read ahead.