Club World Cup 2025: You need to know about the new tournament

The club World Cup is an intercontinental tournament, in which the winners of the most important club competition of their continent have previously participated. For example the Champions League winner in Europe. At the last club World Cup 2023 in old mode, seven teams were still there, they competed against each other in KO games. The Intercontinental Cup took place for the first time last year. In it, the European Champions League winner, Real Madrid, met the winner of a mini tournament of all Champions League winners of the other Confederations, CF Pachuca-final score 3: 0. This final game should continue to take place annually. In addition, there is the new club World Cup.

From this year, the club World Cup will be increased at 32 championships and no longer takes place annually, but only every four years. The participating clubs meet in eight groups with four teams each. Then the two best clubs from each group move into the KO round. The mode is similar to the world championships with nations, which will also take place in a new format from 2026. For the first time, 48 countries compete against each other.

For the club World Cup, each continental association has received a certain contingent at starting places. From Europe, South America, Africa, Asia and Africa, the winners of the continental competitions from 2021 to 2024 are eligible to participate. The remaining places were awarded via rankings, for which the results of the respective tournaments are decisive during this period.

Oceania may only be one team, which is why a similar ranking has been determined from the winners of the OFC Champions League of the past four years. Auckland City best cut off in the ranking. In addition, Inter Miami is a representative of the host country.

Uefa (Europe, 12 participants):

Cordebol (South America, 6 participants):

CAF (Africa, 4 participants):

AFC (Asia, 4 participants):

Concacaf (North and Central America, 4 participants):

OFC (Oceania, 1 participant):

Bayern meet Group C on Auckland City from New Zealand, Boca Juniors from Argentina and Benfica Lisbon from Portugal.

Dortmund plays in Group F against the traditional Brazilian team Fluminense from Rio de Janeiro, Ulsan HD from South Korea and the Mamelodi Sundowns from South Africa.

Before the 2026 World Cup takes place in the USA, Canada and Mexico, the USA will initially host the 2025 club World Cup. The tournament begins on June 15 with the game Al-Nahry against Inter Miami in Hard Rock Stadium. After that, the games will take place in the following eleven cities on July 13th: New York, Atlanta, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Philadelphia, Seattle, Washington DC and Orlando. Two stadiums are available in Orlando.

Players from top clubs have jointly criticized the high load union. According to this, tournaments such as the club World Cup contribute to the fact that professionals have to complete even more games and have less tournament-free summer (read too 🙂

After a long search, FIFA found a media partner: DAZN has exclusively secured the rights for the club World Cup-and is said to have spent a billion US dollars for this (approx. 950 million euros). The sports streaming service broadcasts all games worldwide-and free of charge. This does not require a paid subscription, it says on the part of the Internet station. An account is enough to see the games.

There are no clear reports about this. According to rumors, the inaugural and prize money should range between 30 and 100 million euros.

Sources: “” ,, with dpa material