The paper presents evidence that New Urbanism, defined as a set of normative urban characteristics codified in the 1996 Charter of the New Urbanism, reached a seminal moment with the 2016 New Urban Agenda, a landmark document adopted by acclamation by all 193 member states of the United Nations. The paper compares the two documents and find key parallels between them (including mix of uses, walkable multi-modal streets, buildings defining public space, mix of building ages and heritage patterns, co-production of the city by the citizens, and understanding of the city as an evolutionary self-organizing structure). Both documents also reveal striking contrasts with the still-influential 20th century Athens Charter, from 1933, developed by the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne. The paper outlines the challenge for implementation.