Should the FIFA World Cup Expand to 64 Teams?
Updated July 13, 2026
Updated July 13, 2026
The 2026 FIFA World Cup is in full swing, but that doesn't mean that there isn't already discussion about the 2030 edition of the tournament and beyond. At the center of those discussions have been talks about the potential expansion of the tournament beyond the new 48-team format that debuted in 2026. And while there are no signs that further expansion will happen just yet, it is worth talking about that potential change before it's too late.
According to FIFA president Gianni Infantino, the organization is looking at expanding the tournament to 64 teams. He went on to talk about how such expansion would give more teams outside of Europe and South America the chance to dream about qualifying for a World Cup and how such a move could help grow the sport worldwide. He did not discuss how likely that expansion would be, or if it would actually happen, but such a move certainly deserves some scrutiny.
First, if the tournament does expand, I would be shocked if more European and South American teams weren't at the forefront. The extra slots would likely be allocated proportionally across all confederations, so focusing on the nations outside of the top two confederations feels like misdirection more than anything. But beyond that, there are legitimate questions about how this move would impact the legitimacy of the sport's most prestigious competition.
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The biggest concern with expanding the World Cup to 64 teams is that the accomplishment of qualifying for the World Cup will be further diluted. There were some great stories to come out of the expansion of the 2026 World Cup Field. DR Congo putting a scare into England and Curacao qualifying for its first World Cup are two prime examples of that. But there were also some dismal stories to come from the expanded field.
For example, Tunisia did not belong anywhere near the 2026 World Cup. They lost all three of their group stage matches with a -10 goal difference. Haiti was also not on the level of a World Cup squad, even if it was cool for them to reach that stage. Adding 16 more teams means that we are more likely to see teams perform that poorly than we are to see any new title contenders.
After all, the final four teams standing in the 2026 World Cup are France, Spain, Argentina, and England. The most unlikely quarterfinalist was Switzerland, who has been a strong side for the better part of the last decade. The expansion of the tournament did nothing to create any more serious title contenders, even if Cabo Verde (who would have qualified under the old 32-team format) was a fun story before being eliminated by Argentina.
The reality of this situation is that the only real goal is for FIFA to make more money by expanding the World Cup field further. A larger field means larger media rights deals, as there are more games to broadcast and more advertising to sell within those broadcast windows. This is especially true with the advent of the highly controversial "hydration breaks", which players seemed to survive without before their massive expansion in the 2026 tournament.
FOX holds the English-language broadcast rights for this year's World Cup in the United States. They are said to be making hundreds of millions of dollars from hydration break advertising alone. More games means more hydration breaks. More hydration breaks mean more money for FOX. More money for FOX means more money for FIFA the next time they sell World Cup broadcast rights.
Infantino can pay all the lip service he wants to growing the sport and bringing the World Cup dream to more nations. But if there were not a clear financial incentive to bringing more games to the World Cup, he would not care about those novel-sounding goals. As is always the case with FIFA, dating back to the Joao Havelange and Sepp Blatter administrations, cash is king.
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