Explainer: How does FIFA divide 48-team Men’s World Cup field in groups?
CBC
The draw for the 2026 World Cup takes place Friday at 12 p.m. ET at the Kennedy Center in Washington, for the purpose of dividing the 48-team field into 12 groups of four. Once the tournament starts, 32 teams will advance from those preliminary groups to the single-elimination knockout rounds.
The 12 round-robin World Cup groups are designated Group A, Group B ... and so on, down to Group L.
Here's an explanation of how the draw works.
Balls corresponding with the competing countries will be separated into four pots of 12, and each group will include one team drawn from each pot. The pots are as follows, with each team's current FIFA ranking in parentheses.
Pot 1 — Spain (1), Argentina (2), France (3), England (4), Brazil (5), Portugal (6), Netherlands (7), Belgium (8), Germany (9), United States (14), Mexico (15), Canada (27).
Pot 2 — Croatia (10), Morocco (11), Colombia (13), Uruguay (16), Switzerland (17), Japan (18), Senegal (19), Iran (20), South Korea (22), Ecuador (23), Austria (24), Australia (26).
Pot 3 — Norway (29), Panama (30), Egypt (34), Algeria (35), Scotland (36), Paraguay (39), Tunisia (40), Ivory Coast (42), Uzbekistan (60), Qatar (51), Saudi Arabia (60), South Africa (61).
Pot 4 — Jordan (66), Cape Verde (68), Ghana (72), Curacao (82), Haiti (84), New Zealand (86), UEFA Playoff A, UEFA Playoff B, UEFA Playoff C, UEFA Playoff D, FIFA Playoff 1, FIFA Playoff 2.
The host countries — the U.S., Mexico and Canada — are allowed into pot 1. That's a significant perk because it means they avoid being in a group with several of the tournament's top teams. It has already been determined that Mexico will be put in Group A, Canada in Group B and the U.S. in Group D.
Also, the top four teams in the FIFA ranking — Spain, Argentina, France and England — will be drawn in such a way that, should they win their groups, they would not face each other before the semifinals.
Six of the balls in pot 4 do not correspond with any specific country. That's because six spots at the World Cup won't be determined until March. Four European teams will qualify via the UEFA playoffs, and the additional two FIFA playoffs will include teams from all over the world.
The UEFA Playoff A winner will be either Italy, Northern Ireland, Wales or Bosnia-Herzegovina. UEFA Playoff B will be contested by Ukraine, Sweden, Poland and Albania, UEFA Playoff C by Turkey, Romania, Slovakia and Kosovo, and UEFA Playoff D by Denmark, North Macedonia, the Czech Republic and Ireland.
New Caledonia, Jamaica and Congo will compete in FIFA Playoff 1, and Bolivia, Suriname and Iraq in FIFA Playoff 2.
Wait, Italy hasn't qualified yet?
