Africa World Cup qualification – evaluation, schedule, everything you need to know

The qualification campaign of the Africa World Championship will be resumed this week and the group stage will pass halfway, with the teams learning whether they can make plans for Canada-Mexico-USA next June.

Here ESPN has the final explaner for everything you need to know for the Africa World Cup qualification. The qualification table of Africa Africa World Cup, value, rules, schedule and everything in between.

When and where is the next World Cup?

The FIFA World Cup 26 will begin on June 11, 2026 and run until July 19.

It is the first World Cup to take place in three countries – Canada, Mexico and the United States – with 16 cities who organize games.

The qualification campaign of the CAF World Championship began in November 2023 and will be completed in November of this year, where one of Africa's representatives will lead to a play-off of the Inter Confederation.

The Africa World Cup qualification group program will be completed on October 14, 2025. As a result, nine of Africa's qualification games will be known.

How many African teams qualify for the World Cup?

For the tournament next year, Africa will have at least nine and a maximum of 10 teams, more than the continent has ever previously represented in a global showpiece.

For 2026, the competition from 32 teams has previously expanded to 48, with Africa's assignment of five teams increasing in 2022.

So far, the five African teams, which were present in a single edition of the tournament, were added to the five regular qualifications as hosts in 2010.

Nine representatives are guaranteed for 2026, and Africa will teach one of the six teams to contest the inter-conference's playoffs to decide the last two berths. These games will take place in the World Cup hosts.

Africa World Cup qualifying: How does it work?

The 53 African teams that fought for places at the World Cup were drawn in nine groups of six groups, with each other playing at home and path between November '23 and October '25.

The nine group winners will go through the tournament themselves, with the four best runners-up playing an African playoff to determine which of the quartet represents the continent in the inter-conference playoffs.

For teams that were tied to points after all ten games were played in the first round, groups are sorted by the difference in the goal and then scored the gates.

These African playoffs will take place in November this year. The teams meet in the one -legged semi -finals and then in the final.

Ghana, Gabon, Mozambique and Senegal are the four teams with four games, which are currently promoted in the second round as the four best -ranked second place.

Africa World Cup qualification plan

The group stage started in November 2023, and the teams played their first two games in the last international break of the year.

In June 2024, the competition was again with another double game week -just four months after the Africa Cup of Nations on the Ivory Coast -before the attention of AFCON 2026 qualification program in the second half of last year.

This international break therefore represents the first resumption of the qualifications of the World Cup in nine months. The teams will contest GameWoeks Five and Six before the players return to their club tasks at the end of next week.

Two more double game Week will follow in September and October when the first round comes to an end.

The African playoffs will take place in November 2025, and it seems to be a relatively safe bet that the playoffs between the confederations will be held in one year in March 2026.

The first round continues:

GameWeek Five: 19-22 March 2025

GameWeek six: 23-25 ​​March 2025

GameWeeks Seven 8: 1-9 September 2025

GameWeeks Nine-Ten: 6-14 October 2025

Second round

African playoff semi-final final: 10.-18. November 2025

Inter-Confederation Playoffs: TBC

Will we get a first qualification game?

Only four games, and with so much that the group ranking can still change, it is early to predict the continent world championship representatives.

The extended representation of 9.5 slots should certainly encourage the “lower lights” of the continent that they take advantage of the increased opportunities and either end their waiting time for the qualification or reach a Maiden World Championship.

After four games, group leaders Rwanda, Sudan and Comoros would all be unexpected for the first time and thoroughly, while Libya such as Libya, Gabon and Mozambique are currently on the heels of their respective group leaders.

Can these Minnows get the qualification in the GameWoeks Five and Six closer under control, or will one of these world championships drift out of the dispute?

Something else you need to know?

Since the qualification groups were drawn, Group E was reduced from six teams to four after the withdrawal of Eritrea and the Congo-Brazzaville lock.

Before the campaign began, the former supposedly deployed due to concerns that players would have the opportunity to get out of the warehouse and look for asylum.

In contrast, the Congo played the first two games of the campaign -both -before they could not honor their Spielweek Three game against Niger (to the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo on the basis of concerns), which led to it, which led to it,

As a result, the four teams in the group left a big disadvantage, although the quartet in second place does not have enough points to be too competitive in the second place.

CAF still has to reveal how they will deal with this imbalance between the groups and expect the possibly affected teams – Morocco, Niger, Tanzania, Sambia – to watch nervously.

There were also some controversy in the group H, in which the first two results of equatorial guinea bikes 1-0 win and they had received a few 3-0 defeats in both games, Emilio NSUE than he was not entitled to participate.

That was at the end of 2023, but since NSUE had now officially completed his nationality change from Spain, he can go back to the field and try to save Nzalang's campaign of Nacional.

In view of their reverse results, they are currently the fifth in the group with nine points and not with second place (where they were when NSUE was considered).