2026 FIFA World Cup starts, first tournament with 48 teams

The World Cup opened with the biggest men’s field in tournament history: 48 nations, 104 matches and a month-long schedule spread across the United States, Mexico and Canada. For U.S. audiences, the scale change meant more games to follow and more host-city traffic to absorb as 16 cities shared the burden of staging a tournament that ran from June 11 to July 19.

FIFA said 1,248 players representing 48 nations were on final squad lists after submissions were confirmed on June 2, a record number of players for the competition. That depth gave broadcasters a broader cast to sell, and CBS Sports Golazo Network built part of its coverage around 48 Nations programming. Poppy Miller, the network’s lead host, highlighted the players and teams likely to shape the new tournament structure rather than a single short bracket.

The field still carried the familiar names that define the World Cup’s commercial core: defending champion Argentina, plus Brazil, France, Germany, England and Spain. But expansion also widened the stage for teams that rarely reach this level, including Curaçao, Jordan and Cape Verde. In a 32-team tournament, many of those sides would have had little room to break through. In a 48-team event, they entered with a more realistic chance to force their way into the conversation and alter the story of the competition.

The format itself marked the sharpest break from the modern World Cup era. From 1998 through 2022, the men’s tournament used a 32-team setup; in 2026, it shifted to 12 groups of four and a knockout phase that started with a round of 32. That change reshaped the road to the title, creating more matches, more travel and more pressure on every result. For host cities, it meant longer event windows and a heavier logistical load. For viewers, it meant a tournament built less around a simple march to the final and more around a larger, less predictable race in which more countries had a reason to believe they belonged.