Final preparations are made as FIFA World Cup 2026 Final Draw signage is displayed outside the Kennedy Center yesterday.
Doha: Qatar will discover their FIFA World Cup 2026 Group Stage opponents today when the final tournament draw takes place in Washington DC, marking another major milestone for the Asian champions after securing a historic qualification.
The 2026 World Cup will take place in the United States, Canada and Mexico from June 11 to July 19, with 48 teams in contention for the first time in the history of the global showpiece.
The draw, hosted at the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, will split the finalists into 12 groups of four.
Qatar sealed their spot after topping Group A in the fourth round of Asian qualifiers ahead of Oman and the UAE. It will be their second straight World Cup appearance and the first reached through the traditional qualifying path after hosting FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.
FIFA has placed the qualified teams into four seeding levels based on the world ranking issued on November 19. The three host nations are assigned to the first pot regardless of their ranking, while the remaining teams are distributed across the other pots according to their ranking.
Qatar go into the draw from the third pot, alongside Norway, Panama, Egypt, Algeria, Scotland, Paraguay, Tunisia, Ivory Coast, Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.
That means they will avoid these teams in the group stage.
The first pot includes the best teams in the current FIFA rankings, title holders Argentina, former champions France, Germany, Brazil, England and Spain, along with the three host nations.
The second pot includes Croatia, Morocco, Colombia, Uruguay, Switzerland, Japan, Senegal, Iran, South Korea, Ecuador, Austria and Australia. The fourth pot features Jordan, Cape Verde, Ghana, Curacao, Haiti and New Zealand, plus four European play-off winners listed as teams A, B, C and D, and two more sides from the intercontinental play-offs.
The draw ceremony gets started at 12 p.m. ET (8:00pm Qatar time) today, and will be co-hosted by supermodel Heidi Klum, comedian Kevin Hart and actor and producer Danny Ramirez. The draw will be conducted by former Manchester United and England defender Rio Ferdinand, who will be joined by broadcaster Samantha Johnson and a host of sporting greats, including Tom Brady, Wayne Gretzky, Aaron Judge and Shaquille O’Neal.
