2026 World Cup Draw: What Are Pots?

Before the World Cup begins next summer, all 48 teams – include the U.S. men’s national team and fellow co-hosts Canada and Mexico – will need to know who their opponents will be, which cities they’ll play in, and their path to the final. 

How does that get figured out? Get ready for the World Cup draw. There are a lot of complicated rules around the draw. With some help from USMNT legend and FOX Sports soccer analyst Alexi Lalas, we explain all you need to know about the draw. 

2026 FIFA World Cup Draw 🌎🏆 Everything You Need To Know

When and Where is the Draw? How to Watch?

The World Cup draw will be held at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., on Friday, Dec. 5 at 12 p.m. ET/9 a.m. PT. The draw will air live on FOX and be streamed on FOX One, FOXSports.com and the FOX Sports App. Coverage for the event that will decide the groups for all 48 teams will begin with a live pre-show at 11:30 AM ET/8:30 AM PT. 

The draw will take place from 12:00 PM – 2:00 PM ET and upon its conclusion, live coverage on FOX will continue until 3:00 PM ET providing instant analysis, reactions and interviews.

When is the World Cup?

The World Cup will run from June 11 to July 19, 2026. Spread across three countries, the tournament will culminate with the final on July 19 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The FOX family of networks and the FOX Sports app are your complete home for World Cup content, including live matches, complete highlights, commentary and analysis, and full-match replays.

What Are Pots? How Does It Determine Groups? 

The 48 participating teams (or qualifying slots) will be placed into “pots” based on criteria such as FIFA rankings and confederation constraints. We already know 42 of those 48 teams ahead of the draw. The other six teams will be known by March 2026.

Each of the four pots will have 12 teams (with placeholders for those six March teams). And each group will therefore have one team from each pot. 

The three host nations (Canada, Mexico, and the United States) are already placed into specific groups to ensure their matches occur in their home country.

Teams from the same qualification zone — except for the European confederation (UEFA) — cannot be drawn into the same group. So don’t expect two South American teams (CONMEBOL), for example, in the same group. However, you could see up to two UEFA teams in one. 

Pot 1 

Pot 1 will include the three host nations (United States, Canada, Mexico) plus the nine highest‐ranked qualified teams based on FIFA’s rankings, which were released Nov. 19. That list includes Spain, Argentina, France, England, Brazil, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany. 

Pots 2, 3 & 4

With Pot 1 defined, the remaining qualified teams will be distributed in order into Pot 2, Pot 3 and Pot 4 based on their rankings. Each of these pots will also have 12 teams.

When the draw is held on Dec. 5, there will be six placeholders for the teams that will emerge from various playoff rounds across the globe that will be played in March. Two of those spots will come via an intercontinental playoff, and four will come from a playoff round featuring just European teams. We will explain that later. 

FIFA announced the pots on Nov. 25, so each of the 12 groups at the World Cup will have one team from each pot. 

Are the USA, Canada, and Mexico Already in Teams?

The three co-hosts of the 2026 World Cup are already positioned in respective teams, even when we nonetheless do not know their opponents. This was carried out to make sure that the groups would play their group stage matches of their respective international locations. 

For the USA, the three group-stage video games can be on June 12 (in Los Angeles), June 19 (in Seattle), and June 25 (in Los Angeles). 

For Canada, the three-group stage video games can be on June 12 (in Toronto), June 18 (Vancouver), and June 24 (Vancouver). 

For Mexico, the three-group stage video games can be on June 11 (in Mexico Metropolis), June 18 (Guadalajara), and June 24 (Mexico Metropolis). 

Group A: Canada, TBD, TBD, TBD
Group B: Mexico, TBD, TBD, TBD
Group D: United States, TBD, TBD, TBD

Group C, together with Teams E by L, have but to be assigned. 

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