How is the Portuguese football pyramid organised? | OneFootball

The Portuguese club football pyramid

Portugal’s ability to produce world-class footballers who have prospered in Europe’s biggest clubs, along with the national team’s strong showing in tournaments this century, are well-documented and widely known aspects of Portuguese football.

What is less well-known is the league structure that provides players of outstanding ability with a route to eventually reach the pinnacle of the game.

The likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Bruno Fernandes and Vitinha are just the very elite tip of the iceberg. But the country’s best players and the sport in general in Portugal is sustained by a huge network of clubs that provide a platform for the game to be played with equal passion in every corner of this football-obsessed country.

The Portuguese football pyramid explained

The information below is correct as of the start of the 2026/27 season. The football authorities in Portugal often make structural changes to the way the game at club level is organised in the country, with another shake-up rumoured to be on the cards for next year. Over the past five seasons the pyramid has been set up as follows.

Top Tier

At the top is the Primeira Liga, which is currently an 18-team league. It was first played in a similar format to its current form in 1934/35, with each team playing each other home and away and the winners earning the right to call themselves national champions.

At the end of the season, the bottom two clubs are relegated to the second division, while the team finishing 3rd from last faces a play-off with the team that finished third in Liga II for the last available place in the following season’s top flight.

Second Tier

Portugal’s only other fully professional league is Liga II, also an 18-team division. The teams who finish in the top two places are promoted to the top flight, with the third-placed club having a chance of promotion too, via the playoff. It should be noted that the B-teams of some of Portugal’s major clubs compete in this league but cannot be promoted.

Relegation is the same as in the top flight, whereby the teams who finish in the bottom two positions go down, and the club that finishes third from bottom goes into a playoff to try and preserve their Liga II status.

Third Tier

Liga III is where football in Portugal shifts to semi-professional level and geography comes into play. The season includes two distinct phases. In the first half of the season, the third tier is split into two 10-team regional divisions, Série A (north) and Série B (south).

Clubs finishing in the top four places in each division then form a new nationwide league, where everybody plays each other home and away. The top two teams get promoted to Liga II, and the side finishing third has a chance to join them via a playoff with the club that finished third from bottom in the second division.

Also in the second half of the season, the teams that finished the initial two leagues in positions 5-10 form two new divisions, with the clubs finishing in the last two positions in each league relegated to the Campeonato de Portugal.

Fourth Tier

The Campeonato de Portugal is currently split into four 14-team leagues, on a regional basis (this season clubs from the Azores are in Série 4; clubs from Madeira in Série 2). As with Liga III, the season takes place in two different phases. The top two teams in each of the four leagues qualify for the promotion phase, which comprises two 4-team leagues. The winners and runners-up of each of these leagues are promoted to Liga III.

The bottom five clubs of each of the four initial divisions are relegated into the district leagues.

Fifth Tier

The fifth tier of the Portuguese football pyramid comprises district leagues. Portugal has 22 regional football associations, corresponding to the country’s 18 mainland administrative districts, plus four more covering the islands of Madeira and the Azores.

Each association organises its own leagues, differing greatly in number depending on the size and population of the region in question. For example, the Lisbon FA has 765 registered teams in it, while the Football Association of the Azorean Island of Horta has 38 clubs.

Twenty clubs from the district leagues are promoted each season to the Campeonato de Portugal.

Grass roots. The 22 district Football Associations in mainland Portugal and the Islands of Madeira and the Azores