FIFA Club World Cup 2025: The Format and How Teams Qualify

The FIFA Club World Cup has been given a major revamp ahead of its 21st edition next year.

Previously, the tournament was contested between just seven teams—one from each of FIFA’s six continental confederations and another from the host nation.

Now, no less than 32 teams will take part, and it will be held every four years, as opposed to annually.

Next year, those teams, which include David Beckham’s Inter Miami, will face off across a jam-packed four weeks in the United States between June 15 and July 13.

The format of the 2025 Club World Cup will mimic that of both the FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Champions League.

The 32 teams are first to be drawn into eight groups of four, where they will play each other once.

The winners and runners-up of each group then filter into a knockout tournament consisting of four stages—a round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals and a final.

If there’s a draw in any of the knockout stages, extra-time and penalties will determine who progresses.

Teams from each of world soccer’s six international confederations—AFC, CAF, Concacaf, CONMEBOL, OFC and UEFA—will be present at the 2025 Club World Cup.

Each confederation has been given a specific number of slots based on its strength.

There are 12 slots for teams from Europe, and six for teams from South America. Asia, Africa and North and Central America have four slots each, while Oceania has just one.

The final slot is given to a club from the host nation.

In the case of the dozen clubs from Europe, who qualifies is based on clubs’ Champions League performances across the last four seasons. Winners of the tournament qualify automatically, while the competition’s other best-performing sides in the same period make up the numbers.

These same rules apply to South America.

The last four winners of the Copa Libertadores qualify automatically, while the tournament’s two next-best teams also make the cut.

For Asia, Africa, and North and Central America, because they only have four spots each, the last four winners of each continent’s respective top club competition qualify. For Oceania, because it only has one spot, the highest-ranking club out of the last four winners of the OFC Champions League qualifies.

What happens if there’s a repeat winner of the Champions League, Copa Libertadores, and so on? That slot is simply passed down to the next best-performing side that hasn’t won the tournament.

FIFA has imposed a two team-per-nation rule for the new Club World Cup. Once met, no other team from that country can qualify. It means than next year, a number of Europe’s biggest clubs, including FC Barcelona, Liverpool, and Napoli, will miss out.

There is a caveat, however.

All continental champions have a right to play at the Club World Cup, so if there’s more than two from any given nation across the last four seasons, they all qualify, eating up the spots for the non-winning, best-performing teams.

Mexico and Brazil, for example, will respectively have three and four clubs present at the 2025 Club World Cup because they’ve dominated the Concacaf Champions Cup and CONMEBOL Libertadores in recent years.

Here’s a list of all 31 teams who have qualified for the 2025 Club World Cup on merit, as well as details on how exactly they made it.

The draw for the tournament’s group stage takes place on December 5.

Clubs Qualified as Continental Champions

Clubs Qualified Through Ranking

Inter Miami qualified for the 2025 Club World Cup as the host nation’s club.

FIFA opted to award Miami a place at the tournament because the Floridians won the most recent MLS Supporters’ Shield, which is the trophy given to the team for boasting the best regular-season record.

2023 MLS champions Columbus Crew were overlooked.

The move has been seen by some as FIFA’s way of ensuring that Lionel Messi, who is arguably soccer’s best-ever player, is present and can ramp up the interest in a competition that has yet to fund a buyer for its television rights.

The Times’ Martin Samuel described the decision to include Miami and not the Crew at the 2025 Club World Cup as “classic FIFA corruption.”

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