2026 World Cup format explained: What teams have qualified and how does the tournament work? | OneFootball

We’re under a year away from the 2026 World Cup.

The United States, Mexico and Canada will host the tournament in the summer of 2026 — the biggest edition of the tournament yet. The 2025 Fifa Club World Cup served as a practice tournament for the big one, and it served as a preview to what might come.

There were some worries with the weather and the increased schedule, but there’s not much that can be changed there.

Below, we’ve detailed everything you need to know about the 2026 World Cup format, how it works and who is set to take part next summer.

Which teams will feature and how have they qualified?

The World Cup started in 1930 with just 13 teams involved and split into four groups. It consistently became a 16-team tournament in 1954, before being increased to 24 in 1982. The past seven editions of the World Cup have been 32-team tournaments, with eight groups of four. But now we’ve gone even bigger.

There will be 48 teams at the 2026 World Cup, with 104 games in total. Three of those spots have been taken by the hosts, USA, Mexico and Canada. The remaining 45 spots have been split across the six confederations.

As usual, Uefa have the most teams with 16 — exactly one third of the available spots. There will then be at least nine teams from CAF to represent Africa, with AFC (Asia) having eight direct spots.

Conmebol will have at least six teams representing, with Concacaf also having six (including the three hosts). Oceania (OFC) have just one slot. The final two spots will be confirmed through the inter-confederation play-offs. Two Concacaf nations will join one from each of AFC, CAF, Conmebol and OFC to fight for the final two spots.

2026 Club World Cup confirmed teams

AFC

Concacaf

OFC

Conmebol

How does the 2026 World Cup group stage work?

It isn’t too hard to get your head around the 2026 World Cup group stage format. Even with the 16 extra teams. The 48 teams will be split into 12 groups of four, rather than the previous eight groups.

The groups will follow a round-robin single-game format. So each team plays each other once. At the end of the group stage, the top two teams in each group will advanced to the round of 32. The eight best third-placed teams will also go through the knockout stages.

Now, we don’t know the makeup of the groups just yet. But we do know three of the teams in Groups A-C due to the co-hosts. Mexico are in Group A, with Canada in Group B and USA in Group C.

How does the 2026 World Cup knockout stage work?

This is where it can get a bit messy. Only four group winners have guaranteed opponents for the last 32. In fact, you’ll only know for certain the group of your last-32 opponents if you finish as runners-up.

The winners of Groups C, F, H and J have been paired with set runners-up. Group C’s winners will play Group F’s runners-up and vice versa. It’s the same for the winners and runners-up of Group H and J. The runners-up of Groups A and B will face off, as will the runners-up of Groups K and L, E and I, and D and G.

The remaining eight group winners will play third-placed teams, which should be a better draw for those in Groups A, B, D, E, G, I, K and L. But their opponents will depend on the final rankings of the eight third-placed teams to make it through. For example, Group E’s winners could face the third-placed team from any one of Groups A, B, C, D or F.

Things are more straightforward after that, with direct single-match ties all the way to the final. There is also a third-placed play-off, the day before the final.