The South American section of the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualification acted as qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup held in Canada, Mexico, and the United States, for national teams who were members of CONMEBOL. A total of 6 direct slots in the final tournament and 1 inter-confederation play-off slot were available for CONMEBOL teams.
CONMEBOL was the first confederation to begin its qualification process for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, with Paraguay–Peru being the first match of the global qualification process.
Format On 22 August 2022, CONMEBOL sent a request to FIFA asking to keep the current qualification format that had been used since the 1998 World Cup qualification in South America. This was confirmed, with the first games of the qualifiers tentatively to be played in March or June 2023.
On 27 February 2023, CONMEBOL president Alejandro Domínguez announced that the qualifiers would start in September 2023, which was ratified by the CONMEBOL Council in the run-up to the 73rd FIFA Congress held on 16 March in Kigali, Rwanda.
The qualification structure remained the same as in previous editions (despite the increase of slots available to CONMEBOL teams), wherein each team played each other team twice in a home-and-away round-robin format.
Prior to the commencement of the qualification competition, Ecuador were deducted 3 points for the use of a document containing false information for Byron Castillo in the previous World Cup qualification cycle.
Schedule The qualifying matches were held on a total of 18 matchdays on dates that fall within the FIFA International Match Calendar. The match schedule was the same that was used in the previous edition of the competition. Six matchdays were played in each of 2023, 2024, and 2025.
+2023MatchdayDateMatchday 17–8 September 2023Matchday 212 September 2023Matchday 312 October 2023Matchday 417 October 2023Matchday 516 November 2023Matchday 621 November 2023+2024MatchdayDateMatchday 75–6 September 2024Matchday 810 September 2024Matchday 910–11 October 2024Matchday 1015 October 2024Matchday 1114–15 November 2024Matchday 1219 November 2024+2025MatchdayDateMatchday 1320–21 March 2025Matchday 1425 March 2025Matchday 155–6 June 2025Matchday 1610 June 2025Matchday 174 September 2025Matchday 189 September 2025
Entrants All 10 national teams from CONMEBOL entered qualification.
Team FIFA ranking as of July 2023 1 3 16 17 21 32 40 49 57 83
Standings
Matches Matchday 1
Matchday 2
Matchday 3
Matchday 4
Matchday 5
Matchday 6
Matchday 7
Matchday 8
Matchday 9
Matchday 10
Matchday 11
Matchday 12
Matchday 13
Matchday 14
Matchday 15
Matchday 16
Matchday 17
Matchday 18
Inter-confederation play-offs
The seventh-place team, Bolivia, joined DR Congo (from CAF), 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 matches. The winners met the two highest-ranked teams in another set of matches, with the winners of these matches qualifying for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Qualified teams
The following teams from CONMEBOL qualified for the final tournament. Team Qualified as Qualified onPrevious appearances in FIFA World Cup 18 (1930, 1934, 1958, 1962, 1966, 1974, 1978, 1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022) 4 (2002, 2006, 2014, 2022) 6 (1962, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2014, 2018) 14 (1930, 1950, 1954, 1962, 1966, 1970, 1974, 1986, 1990, 2002, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022) 22 (1930, 1934, 1938, 1950, 1954, 1958, 1962, 1966, 1970, 1974, 1978, 1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022) 8 (1930, 1950, 1958, 1986, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010)
Goalscorers
Discipline A player was automatically suspended for the next match for the following infractions: Receiving a red card (red card suspensions could be extended for serious infractions) Receiving two yellow cards in two different matches (yellow card suspensions were carried forward to further qualification rounds, but not the finals or any other future international matches) The following suspensions were served during qualification: