Athletics events were contested at the 1985 Summer Universiade in Kobe, Japan between 29 August and 4 September. New events were women's 10,000 metres and 5000 metres walk.

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 metres (wind: 0.0 m/s) details	Chidi Imoh (NGR)	10.22	Andrés Simón (CUB)	10.28	Lee McNeill (USA)	10.33
200 metres (wind: +0.1 m/s) details	Leandro Peñalver (CUB)	20.57	Atlee Mahorn (CAN)	20.65	Chang Jae-Keun (KOR)	20.78
400 metres details	Innocent Egbunike (NGR)	45.10	Roberto Hernández (CUB)	45.41	Sunday Uti (NGR)	45.58
800 metres details	Ryszard Ostrowski (POL)	1:44.38	Viktor Kalinkin (URS)	1:45.21	John Marshall (USA)	1:45.32
1500 metres details	Chris McGeorge (GBR)	3:46.22	Adam Dixon (USA)	3:46.29	Dragan Zdravković (YUG)	3:46.78
5000 metres details	Stefano Mei (ITA)	13:56.48	Carey Nelson (CAN)	13:57.77	Rob Lonergan (CAN)	13:58.02
10,000 metres details	Keith Brantly (USA)	29:11.24	Jesús Herrera (MEX)	29:11.71	Shuichi Yoneshige (JPN)	29:11.73
Marathon details	Orlando Pizzolato (ITA)	2:20:06	Salvatore Nicosia (ITA)	2:21:09	Paul Gompers (USA)	2:21:40
110 metres hurdles (wind: -0.7 m/s) details	Cletus Clark (USA)	13.57	György Bakos (HUN)	13.72	Keith Talley (USA)	13.76
400 metres hurdles details	Tagir Zemskov (URS)	49.38	Henry Amike (NGR)	49.70	René Djédjémel Mélédjé (CIV)	49.73
3000 metres steeplechase details	Franco Boffi (ITA)	8:28.75	Eddie Wedderburn (GBR)	8:28.90	Hans Koeleman (NED)	8:32.19
4 × 100 metres relay details	Cuba (CUB) Ricardo Chacón Leandro Peñalver Sergio Querol Andrés Simón	38.76	Canada (CAN) Rick Jones Mike Dwyer Cyprian Enweani Atlee Mahorn	39.07	United States (USA) Lee McNeill Thomas Jefferson Keith Talley Mike Morris Lorenzo Daniel	39.15
4 × 400 metres relay details	Cuba (CUB) Lázaro Martínez Leandro Peñalver Roberto Ramos Roberto Hernández	3:02.20	Soviet Union (URS) Tagir Zemskov Sergey Kutsebo Yevgeniy Lomtyev Vladimir Prosin	3:02.66	United States (USA) Clarence Daniel LeRoy Dixson Dale Laverty Cedric Vaughans	3:02.68
20 kilometres walk details	Viktor Mostovik (URS)	1:25:52	Andrey Perlov (URS)	1:25:52	Guillaume LeBlanc (CAN)	1:26:22
High jump details	Igor Paklin (URS)	2.41	Francisco Centelles (CUB)	2.31	Gerd Nagel (FRG)	2.26
Pole vault details	Radion Gataullin (URS)	5.75	Philippe Collet (FRA)	5.70	David Volz (USA)	5.60
Long jump details	Jaime Jefferson (CUB)	8.07	Robert Emmiyan (URS)	8.03	Stanisław Jaskułka (POL)	7.99
Triple jump details	Charles Simpkins (USA)	17.86	Alexander Yakovlev (URS)	17.43	John Herbert (GBR)	17.41
Shot put details	Remigius Machura (TCH)	21.13	Alessandro Andrei (ITA)	20.85	Ventsislav Khristov (BUL)	19.90
Discus throw details	Luis Delís (CUB)	66.84	Vaclavas Kidykas (URS)	63.12	Juan Martínez Brito (CUB)	63.02
Hammer throw details	Heinz Weis (FRG)	76.00	Lucio Serrani (ITA)	74.08	Igor Nikulin (URS)	74.04
Javelin throw details	Dumitru Negoiţă (ROM)	84.62	Wolfram Gambke (FRG)	84.46	Jean-Paul Lakafia (FRA)	82.96
Decathlon details	Mike Ramos (USA)	8071	Valter Külvet (URS)	7971	Michael Neugebauer (FRG)	7895

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 metres details	Irina Slyusar (URS)	11.22	Anelia Nuneva (BUL)	11.29	Grace Jackson (JAM)	11.35
200 metres (wind: -2.3 m/s) details	Grace Jackson (JAM)	22.59	Elżbieta Tomczak (POL)	22.76	Irina Slyusar (URS)	22.86
400 metres details	Tatyana Alekseyeva (URS)	51.49	Ana Fidelia Quirot (CUB)	52.10	Sadia Showunmi (NGR)	52.78
800 metres details	Nadezhda Zvyagintseva (URS)	1:58.59	Cristieana Cojocaru (ROM)	1:59.09	Ana Fidelia Quirot (CUB)	1:59.77
1500 metres details	Svetlana Kitova (URS)	4:07.12	Margareta Keszeg (ROM)	4.07.55	Darlene Beckford (USA)	4:08.84
3000 metres details	Cathy Branta (USA)	9:02.75	Kathy Hayes (USA)	9:02.92	Angela Chalmers (CAN)	9:03.19
10,000 metres details	Marina Rodchenkova (URS)	32:58.45	Svetlana Guskova (URS)	32:59.24	Kirsten O'Hara (USA)	33:05.84
Marathon details	Mami Fukao (JPN)	2:44:55	Patti Gray (USA)	2:46:20	Sylvie Bornet (FRA)	2:48:11
100 metres hurdles (wind: +0.4 m/s) details	Ginka Zagorcheva (BUL)	12.71	Nadezhda Korshunova (URS)	12.87	Anne Piquereau (FRA)	12.96
400 metres hurdles details	Margarita Navickaitė (URS)	55.33	Cristieana Cojocaru (ROM)	55.44	Nawal El Moutawakel (MAR)	55.59
4 × 100 metres relay details	United States (USA) Kathrene Wallace Michelle Finn Brenda Cliette Gwen Torrence	43.29	Soviet Union (URS) Nadezhda Korshunova Marina Molokova Irina Slyusar Yelena Vinogradova	43.43	Bulgaria (BUL) Silvia Khristova Anelia Nuneva Pepa Pavlova Ginka Zagorcheva	43.57
4 × 400 metres relay details	Soviet Union (URS) Margarita Navickaitė Nadezhda Zvyagintseva Yelena Korban Tatyana Alekseyeva	3:25.96	Canada (CAN) Charmaine Crooks Esmie Lawrence Camille Cato Molly Killingbeck	3:29.06	United States (USA) Susan Shurr Sharon Dabney Tanya McIntosh Joetta Clark	3:30.41
5000 metres walk details	Aleksandra Grigoryeva (URS)	22:21.10	Yan Hong (CHN)	22:25.77	Natalya Serbinenko (URS)	22:27.21
High jump details	Silvia Costa (CUB)	2.01	Lyudmila Petrus (URS)	1.93	Danuta Bułkowska (POL)	1.91
Long jump details	Irina Valyukevich (URS)	7.04	Silvia Khristova (BUL)	6.62	Marieta Ilcu (ROM)	6.61
Shot put details	Natalya Lisovskaya (URS)	20.47	Yang Yanqin (CHN)	17.79	Ramona Pagel (USA)	17.46
Discus throw details	Maritza Martén (CUB)	66.66	Tsvetanka Khristova (BUL)	65.30	Daniela Costian (ROM)	63.20
Javelin throw details	Ivonne Leal (CUB)	71.82	Beate Peters (FRG)	63.70	María Caridad Colón (CUB)	62.46
Heptathlon details	Małgorzata Guzowska (POL)	6616	Liliana Năstase (ROM)	6313	Judy Simpson (GBR)	6045

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Soviet Union (URS)	14	11	3	28
2	Cuba (CUB)	7	4	3	14
3	United States (USA)	6	3	11	20
4	Italy (ITA)	3	3	0	6
5	Bulgaria (BUL)	2	3	2	7
6	Nigeria (NGR)	2	1	2	5
	Poland (POL)	2	1	2	5
8	Romania (ROM)	1	4	2	7
9	West Germany (FRG)	1	2	2	5
10	Great Britain (GBR)	1	1	2	4
11	Jamaica (JAM)	1	0	1	2
	Japan (JPN)*	1	0	1	2
13	Czechoslovakia (TCH)	1	0	0	1
14	Canada (CAN)	0	4	3	7
15	China (CHN)	0	2	0	2
16	France (FRA)	0	1	3	4
17	Hungary (HUN)	0	1	0	1
	Mexico (MEX)	0	1	0	1
19	Ivory Coast (CIV)	0	0	1	1
	Morocco (MAR)	0	0	1	1
	Netherlands (NED)	0	0	1	1
	South Korea (KOR)	0	0	1	1
	Yugoslavia (YUG)	0	0	1	1
Totals (23 entries)		42	42	42	126

• 1985 in athletics (track and field)

• World Student Games (Universiade – Men) – GBR Athletics
• World Student Games (Universiade – Women) – GBR Athletics