When the 22nd Fifa World Cup kicks off in Qatar, it will be almost unrecognisable from the first edition of the tournament 92 years ago. Played in Uruguay, just 13 teams took part, split across three groups of three and one of four.
Bolivia, Romania and Paraguay were among the sides competing in the inaugural tournament, but modern World Cup stalwarts like Germany, Italy and England did not make the trip.
The competition has expanded multiple times since and there are plans for even further expansion ahead of the 2026 tournament.
How many teams will play at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar?
There will be 32 teams competing in Qatar, split across eight groups of four.
The top two teams from the eight groups are then placed in a round of 16, where teams which have topped one group will face the second-placed team from another.
Every World Cup since France ’98 has been played in this format, increasing from 24 teams after USA ’94.
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The 1998 expansion to 32 teams allowed Croatia, Jamaica, Japan and South Africa to qualify for the first time.
Since then, smaller nations like Slovenia, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Angola, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Iceland have taken advantage of the expanded format to qualify for their first World Cups.
Hosts Qatar are the only team to make their debut in the 2022 competition, while Wales will compete in their first World Cup since 1958.
Brazil are the only team to have competed at every edition of the World Cup without the need for playoffs.
World Cup 2022 groups
Group A
- Qatar
- Ecuador
- Senegal
- Netherlands
- England
- Iran
- United States
- Wales
Group C
- Argentina
- Saudi Arabia
- Mexico
- Poland
Group D
- France
- Australia
- Denmark
- Tunisia
Group E
- Spain
- Costa Rica
- Germany
- Japan
Group F
- Belgium
- Canada
- Morocco
- Croatia
Group G
- Brazil
- Serbia
- Switzerland
- Cameroon
Group H
- Portugal
- Ghana
- Uruguay
- South Korea
How many teams will play at the 2026 World Cup?
The 2026 World Cup will take place across Canada, Mexico and the USA.
It will be the first time the tournament has been held in Canada, but a record third time Mexico have been hosts or co-hosts, after 1970 and 1986.
It will also be the first World Cup to have 48 teams competing. Unlike the four-team group formats we have become used to in international and European club tournaments, the 2026 edition will be split into 16 groups of three.
After the group stage, the top two teams in each group will go into a knockout round of 32, before the familiar format resumes: round of 16, quarter-finals, semi-final and final.
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The tournament will have more games – 80 instead of the current 64 – but individual teams will still play the same number of games, and less if they are knocked out in the group stage.
Other potential changes include the introduction of penalties in the group stage, which was suggested by Fifa’s chief technical officer Marco van Basten as a way to discourage draws.
The qualification process for the 2026 World Cup has not yet been confirmed, but the breakdown of the national slot allocation has been.
A total of 16 European teams will compete at the 2026 competition, alongside at least nine from Africa, eight from Asia, six from North America and the Caribbean and one from Oceania.
At least six South American sides will also qualify – a whopping 60 per cent of the ten nations in the Conmebol confederation, meaning we can expect to see the likes of Chile, Colombia and Peru back in 2026.
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