2026 FIFA World Cup qualification (CAF)

The 2026 FIFA World Cup qualification (CAF) was the African section of the qualification tournament for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, to be held in the United States, Canada and Mexico. A total of nine slots in the final tournament and one inter-confederation play-off slot were reserved for Confederation of African Football (CAF) teams.

Format

Due to nine CAF teams now directly qualifying instead of five, the CAF Executive Committee announced a new qualification format on 19 May 2023. Teams were drawn into nine groups of six teams. The winner of each group directly qualified to the World Cup, while the four best group runners-up participated in play-offs to determine which team would advance to the inter-confederation play-offs.

• First round (group stage): Nine groups of six teams played in a home-and-away round-robin tournament. Group winners qualified for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
• Second round (play-off): The four best group runners-up were seeded into play-offs to determine the CAF representative at the inter-confederation play-offs.

Schedule

First round

Teams were drawn into nine groups of six teams to play home-and-away round robin matches from November 2023 to October 2025. The winners of each group qualified directly to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, and the four best group runners-up advanced to a play-off to determine which team would advance to the inter-confederation play-offs.

Draw

The draw was held on 13 July 2023 at 15:00 GMT (UTC±0) in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. All 54 FIFA-affiliated football associations from CAF entered qualification. However, Eritrea withdrew after the draw.

The draw pots were announced on 30 June (numbers in parentheses indicate FIFA Men's World Ranking at the time of the draw):

Groups

Group A

Group B

Group C

Group D

Group E

Group F

Group G

Group H

Group I

Ranking of runners-up

On 14 March 2025, CAF notified its member associations that matches against sixth-place teams would be excluded when ranking the runners-up, due to Group E having five teams following the withdrawal of Eritrea. This information was not announced publicly by either CAF or FIFA.

Second round

The four best group runners-up (Cameroon, DR Congo, Gabon, and Nigeria) advanced to play-offs to determine the sole CAF representative at the inter-confederation play-offs. The matchups for the semi-final were based on the 17 October 2025 FIFA rankings, with the highest-ranked side taking on the lowest and the second-highest taking on the third-highest. A total of three matches were played, all hosted in Morocco.

Inter-confederation play-offs

The winner of the second round, DR Congo, will join Bolivia (from CONMEBOL), Iraq (from AFC), Jamaica and Suriname (both from CONCACAF), and New Caledonia (from OFC) in the inter-confederation play-offs.

The teams were ranked according to the November 2025 FIFA Men's World Ranking, with the four lowest-ranked teams playing in two single-elimination matches. The winners will meet the two highest-ranked teams in another set of single-elimination matches, with the winners of these matches qualifying for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

Qualified teams

The following teams from CAF qualified for the final tournament.

Notes

Top goalscorers

There were 648 goals scored in 259 matches, for an average of 2.5 goals per match.

10 goals

9 goals

8 goals

7 goals

6 goals

5 goals

Below are full goalscorer lists for each group and the second round:

References