2027 FIFA Women's World Cup qualification (UEFA)

The European qualifying tournament for the 2027 FIFA Women's World Cup to determine the UEFA teams that will qualify directly for the final tournament and for the inter-confederation play-offs will take place from February to December 2026.^[1]

On 24 September 2024, UEFA approved the initial regulations and tentative match schedule for qualification. Following FIFA's confirmation of qualification slots, UEFA finalized the regulations for qualification which will occur over two phases:^[2]

• League phase: The teams entering qualification will be divided into three leagues based on the 2025 UEFA Women's Nations League overall phase ranking (Regulations Article 21):^[2]
  • League A will consist of the teams ranked 1–16 to be drawn into four groups of four teams each.
  • League B will consist of the teams ranked 17–32 to be drawn into four groups of four teams each.
  • League C will consist of the remaining teams to be drawn into three groups of four teams each and three groups of three teams each; the number and sizes of groups may change based upon the number of teams entering qualification.

All groups will play a league format, playing all other teams at home and away (Regulations Article 22).^[2] The League A group winners will qualify directly for the Women's World Cup, and two rounds of play-offs will determine the remaining direct qualification slots and the inter-confederation play-offs representatives (Regulations Article 27.01–27.02).^[2]

• Play-off phase: Teams will be drawn into paths to play two rounds of home-and-away knockout matches (Regulations Article 27.03–27.08):^[2]
  • Round 1:
    • Path 1 will consist of the runners-up and third-place teams from League A competing against the group winners and two best-ranked runners-up from League C. The League A teams will be seeded and will play the second leg at home.
    • Path 2 will consist of the fourth-place teams from League A and League B group winners competing against the runners-up and third-place teams from League B. The League A fourth-place teams and League B group winners will be seeded and play the second leg at home.
    • The winners of each two-legged tie will advance to Round 2.
  • Round 2: The Round 1 Path 1 winners will compete against the Round 1 Path 2 winners. The Round 1 Path 1 winners will be seeded and will play the second leg at home.

The seven Round 2 winners with the best overall league-phase final rankings will qualify directly for the Women's World Cup, and the remaining Round 2 winner will advance to the inter-confederation play-offs.

During the league phase, teams will be ranked according to standings points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If teams are tied in standings points, tiebreaking criteria will be applied (Regulations Article 23):^[2]

If teams still remain tied, then the following criteria are applied only to those teams that remain tied:

The anticipated draw and match schedule is below.^[1]

Fifty-three nations are eligible to submit entries to compete in qualification. San Marino does not field a national women's team, and Russia were suspended indefinitely on 28 February 2022 from participating in UEFA and FIFA competitions due to their country's invasion of Ukraine^[3] and were excluded by UEFA from the list of participants.^[1]

Teams will play home-and-away matches against each other team in their group.

The league phase draws are scheduled take place 4 November 2025, with the draw procedures yet to be announced.

The UEFA Executive Committee has voted to prohibit certain teams from facing off due to geopolitical conflicts, and other nations have draw conditions based on travel distance or extreme winter weather. Any applicable restrictions will be announced with the draw procedures and draw pot allocations.

Group winners will qualify for the final tournament in Brazil. All other teams will advance to the play-off phase

Group winners, runners-up, and third-place teams will advance to the play-off phase.

Group winners and the two best-ranked runners-up will advance to the play-off phase.

At the conclusion of the league phase, teams will be ranked according to the following criteria (Regulations Article 24.01):^[2]

The draws for both play-off rounds are scheduled to take place 22 June 2026, with draw procedures to be announced. If teams prohibited from facing each other could meet in the second round, the play-off round 2 draw would be scheduled to take place 16 October 2026.^[1]