Changes to the Asian Preliminary Round Format

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has decided to change the format of the women’s football World Cup and Olympic qualifying tournaments.

Until now, the Women’s Asian Cup has served as an Asian qualifier for the Women’s World Cup. However, going forward, women’s soccer will also play the World Cup qualifiers separately like men’s soccer.

2031 Women’s World Cup Asian Qualifiers Format

The 2031 Women’s World Cup Asian qualifiers will be held in three rounds.

The top 22 teams based on the FIFA rankings advance directly to the second qualifying round, while the remaining teams play in the first qualifying round, with two teams earning spots in the second qualifying round.

In the second preliminary round, 24 teams are divided into six groups of four teams each. The teams in each group meet in one location and face off once, with the top two teams from each group advancing to the third preliminary round.

In the third preliminary round, which also serves as the final qualifier, teams will be divided into three groups of four teams each and compete in a home-and-away round-robin format to determine the teams that will advance to the World Cup finals.

Olympic Women’s Soccer Asian Qualifiers

The Olympic women’s soccer Asian qualifiers, which were held separately, will be held in conjunction with the Women’s Asian Cup.

The eight countries that advanced to the Women’s Asian Cup will compete for a spot in the Olympics. The teams will be divided into two groups of four teams each and will play a home-and-away round-robin format, with the top team from each group advancing to the Olympic stage.