Less than 200 days before the start of the premiere FIFA World Cup 48 teamsThe procedures for determining the composition of the twelve groups consisting of four teams that will take part in the first phase of the tournament have been confirmed. The final draw, one of the most exciting moments on the road to a world title, will bring together the coaches and managers of all the qualifying teams – and those still competing – on Friday December 5 at the prestigious John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC. Italy, involved in the playoffs in March, will also be watching the draw closely.
World Cup, draw
The final extraction procedure requires the host country – Canada, Mexico and the United States – will be assigned to the first Potwhile the other 39 qualifying teams will be distributed in four Pots of twelve teams each, based on the men’s FIFA world rankings published on Wednesday 19 November 2025. Finally, the two places reserved for the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifying tournament teams, as well as the four places related to European qualification, will be placed in the fourth Pot.
Pot 1: Canada, Mexico, United States, Spain, Argentina, France, United Kingdom, Brazil, Portugal, Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. Pot 2: Croatia, Morocco, Colombia, Uruguay, Switzerland, Japan, Senegal, Iran PR, Republic of Korea, Ecuador, Austria and Australia. Pot 3: Norway, Panama, Egypt, Algeria, Scotland, Paraguay, Tunisia, Ivory Coast, Uzbekistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. Pot 4: Jordan, Cape Verde, Ghana, Curaçao, Haiti, New Zealand, European Qualifiers A, B, C and D, FIFA Qualifiers 1 and 2.
How the World Cup draw works
The draw will begin with all the teams in Pot 1, which will be distributed from Group A to Group L. Next, pots 2, 3 and 4 will be drawn, in order. In Pot 1, Canada, Mexico and the United States as host countries will be identified with different colored balls. According to the match schedule published on February 4 2024, Mexico will get position A1 (green ball), Canada position B1 (red ball), and the US position D1 (blue ball). The other nine teams in Pot 1 will be identified by nine balls of the same color and will automatically be placed in position 1 in the group they were placed in.
To ensure competitive balance, they were established two separate draws to the semifinals of the fixture calendar. In order to achieve a balanced distribution of teams, the following draw restrictions have been implemented for the top four teams in the FIFA/Coca-Cola Men’s World Rankings: The top ranked (Spain) and second highest ranked (Argentina) teams will be randomly assigned to opposing teams. The same principle will apply to the third and fourth ranked teams (France and England respectively). Therefore, if the top two teams in the world ranking manage to complete the first phase by occupying first place in their respective groups, then they will not face each other before the final.
In Pots 2, 3 and 4, the team’s position in each group will be determined according to a predetermined scheme. In principle, no group contains two teams from the same confederation, with the exception of UEFA, which is represented by 16 teams. Each group will have at least one and a maximum of two UEFA teams. Regarding places in FIFA Qualifying Tournaments, in order to comply with FIFA’s general principle that two teams from the same confederation will not be drawn into the same group, this limit will also apply to the three teams in each FIFA Qualifying Tournament draw competing for two places in Pot 4.
