2025 FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship

Volleyball tournament in the Philippines

8 min read

The 2025 FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship was the 21st staging of the FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship, contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball (FIVB). It took place in two cities of the Philippines from 12 to 28 September 2025, and the first edition under the two-year cycles in odd-numbered years with an expanded format featuring 32 teams.

The tournament was the first World Championship hosted in Southeast Asia, and the second of two consecutive World Championships in 2025 held in this region, following the Women's World Championship in Thailand. The Philippines became the second country in Asia to host the World Championship, following Japan. The competition was also the second world senior championship in Olympic team sports to be hosted in the Philippines. Italy were the defending champions, having won their fourth title in 2022, and remains as the reigning world champions after winning the 2025 Championship on 28 September 2025. With the win, Italy equaled a record previously held only by the USSR by becoming world volleyball champions in both the men’s and women’s competitions — the Soviet Union achieved the feat in 1952 and 1960.

Background

Previously, the competition format was determined through agreements between the host country and the FIVB, resulting in varying and inconsistent formats. In March 2022, the FIVB Board of Administration approved the new proposed World Championship format. To standardize, the proposed format started with a pool phase and then proceeded with a direct elimination phase. Additionally, they proposed increasing the number of teams from 24 to 32 to guarantee universality. The new format of the World Championship was confirmed in late 2022 and started with this edition.

In May 2022, the FIVB revealed the television rights agreement for Polsat covering the competition events from 2022 to 2032, which included a new event to be held in 2025 and 2029. Before that, Fabio Azevedo, now the FIVB president and a member of the Board of Administration, suggested that the World Championships be held in 2027 and subsequently every two years, while the Continental Championships would take place in 2026 and 2028, serving as qualifiers for the World Championships. However, the proposed timeline was moved up after the FIVB announced the competition calendar for 2025 to 2028 in June 2023, shifting the World Championships to 2025 and using the 2023 Continental Championships as qualifiers for that event.

Host selection

The bidding procedure to host the 2025 and 2027 FIVB World Championships began in August 2023. National federations had until 31 August 2023 to register interest. Around 31 countries expressed interest to host the tournament. This figure was reduced to three final candidates: Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines. On 20 March 2024, FIVB announced that the Philippines was selected to host the tournament.

Qualification

The host country Philippines qualified for the competition as well as the defending champions Italy. The top three teams from each of the 2023 Continental Championships secured qualification. The final 15 places belonged to top 15 teams as per FIVB World Ranking who had not yet qualified.

Notes: ^a France, 4th placers of the tournament qualified since Italy, the runners-up of this tournament were the defending world champions.; ^b Competed as East Germany from 1956 to 1990 (7 times) and as West Germany from 1956 to 1990 (8 times); 5 appearances as Germany.; ^c Competed as SFR Yugoslavia from 1956 to 1970 (4 times) and as Serbia and Montenegro from 1998 to 2006 (3 times); 4 appearances as Serbia.; ^d Competed as Czechoslovakia from 1949 to 1990; 5 appearances as Czech Republic.

Format

The tournament is played in two rounds: a preliminary round (pool phase) and a final round (direct elimination phase). During the preliminary round, 32 qualified teams were divided into eight pools, labeled A through H, with four teams in each pool. In this phase, every team within a pool competed against the other three teams once. After the pool phase, the top two teams from each pool will advanced to the final round, creating a round of 16 teams. Simultaneously, the bottom two teams from each pool will be ranked from 17th to 32nd based on the Team Combined Ranking System.

The final round follows a single-elimination format with the round of 16 match-ups determined by each team's pool and ranking position. The initial pairings—A1 versus H2, H1 versus A2, D1 versus E2, E1 versus D2, B1 versus G2, G1 versus B2, C1 versus F2, and F1 versus B2—ensured that teams from pools A, D, E, and H will not encounter with teams from pools B, C, F, and G until the final match. As the competition progresses, the round of 16 losers will be ranked from 9th to 16th according to the Team Combined Ranking System, while the winners will advance to the quarterfinals. The quarterfinals followed a similar pattern, with losing teams will rank from 5th to 8th, and victorious teams will moving to the next stage of the competition. In the semifinals, the losers will compete for the third place, while the winners will face each other in the final match.

Pools composition

The 32 teams were distributed to eight pools of four teams. The draw of lots took place at Solaire Hotel in Parañaque on 14 September 2024. Rankings of teams are shown in brackets.

The host and the top seven teams are automatically seeded as the first teams of the eight pools.

Draw

Team ranking system

Pool standing procedure

To establish the ranking of the teams after the preliminary round, the following criteria were implemented:

Total number of victories (matches won, matches lost)
In the event of a tie, the teams will be ranked by the most point gained per match as follows:
- Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 points for the winner, 0 points for the loser
- Match won 3–2: 2 points for the winner, 1 point for the loser
- Match forfeited: 3 points for the winner, 0 points (0–25, 0–25, 0–25) for the loser
If teams are still tied after examining the number of victories and points gained, then the FIVB will examine the results in order to break the tie in the following order:
- Set quotient: if two or more teams are tied on the number of points gained, they will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of the number of all set won by the number of all sets lost.
- Points quotient: if the tie persists based on the set quotient, the teams will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of all points scored by the total of points lost during all sets.
- If the tie persists based on the point quotient, the tie will be broken based on the team that won the match of the Round Robin Phase between the tied teams. When the tie in point quotient is between three or more teams, these teams ranked taking into consideration only the matches involving the teams in question.

Teams combined ranking system

To establish the final ranking of the teams, the following criteria were implemented:

Position of the team in the Pool (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th)
Total number of victories (matches won, matches lost)
In the event of a tie, the teams will be ranked by the most point gained per match as follows:
- Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 points for the winner, 0 points for the loser
- Match won 3–2: 2 points for the winner, 1 point for the loser
- Match forfeited: 3 points for the winner, 0 points (0–25, 0–25, 0–25) for the loser
If teams are still tied after examining the number of victories and points gained, then the FIVB will examine the results in order to break the tie in the following order:
- Set quotient: if two or more teams are tied on the number of points gained, they will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of the number of all set won by the number of all sets lost.
- Points quotient: if the tie persists based on the set quotient, the teams will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of all points scored by the total of points lost during all sets.
- If the tie persists based on the point quotient, the tie will be broken based on the team that won the match of the Round Robin Phase between the tied teams. When the tie in point quotient is between three or more teams, these teams ranked taking into consideration only the matches involving the teams in question.

After the round of 16 and the quarterfinals, the eliminated teams were ranked in the final standings according to the Teams Combined Ranking System, which takes into account all matches played during both the preliminary and final rounds.