The 2025 UEFA Women's Nations League was the second season of the UEFA Women's Nations League, an international women's football competition contested by the senior women's national teams of the member associations of UEFA. The league phase of the competition was played between February and June, with the finals tournament took place between October and December. The results also determined the leagues for the FIFA Women's World Cup 2027 qualifying competition.
Spain, the defending champions, successfully defended the title after beating Germany 3–0 on aggregate in the 2025 finals.
Format The competition began with the league stage, featuring the national teams split into three leagues (A, B, and C) according to the Women’s European Qualifiers overall phase rankings (based on the Women's Euro 2025 qualifying overall ranking, taking into consideration promotion/relegation at the conclusion of that competition). Leagues A and B featured 16 teams in four groups of four teams, while League C consisted of the remaining competition entrants split into groups of three or four teams. The teams in each group played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format.
The four group winners of League A advanced to the Nations League Finals, consisting of two semi-finals, a third place play-off, and a final, all played over two legs (this differed to the previous edition where all the Nations Leagues Finals matches were single-legged). An open draw determined the pairings and order of legs for the semi-final matches, as well as which semi-final pairing will have its teams host the first leg of the third-place play-off and final.
In addition, the competition featured promotion and relegation, taking effect in Women's World Cup 2027 qualifying (which uses an identical league structure). The group winners of Leagues B and C were automatically promoted, while the fourth-placed teams in Leagues A and B, as well as the two lowest-ranked third-placed teams in League B, were automatically relegated. Promotion/relegation play-offs were also held on a home-and-away basis, taking place in parallel with the Nations League semi-finals, to determine which of the other teams were promoted, relegated or remain in their respective leagues. The third-placed teams of League A played the runners-up of League B, while the two best-ranked third-placed teams in League B played the two best-ranked League C runners-up. The teams from the higher leagues were seeded, and played the second leg at home.
In all two-legged ties, the team that scored more goals on aggregate was the winner. If the aggregate score was level, extra time would be played (the away goals rule did not apply). If the score remained level after extra time, a penalty shoot-out would be used to decide the winner.
Tiebreakers Tiebreakers for group ranking If two or more teams in the same group were equal on points on completion of the league phase, the following tie-breaking criteria were applied:
Criteria for league ranking Individual league rankings were established according to the following criteria: Position in the group; Higher number of points; Higher goal difference; Higher number of goals scored; Higher number of goals scored away from home; Higher number of wins; Higher number of wins away from home; Lower disciplinary points total (1 point for a single yellow card, 3 points for a red card as a consequence of two yellow cards, 3 points for a direct red card, 4 points for a yellow card followed by a direct red card). Position in the Women's European Qualifiers overall phase ranking. When ranking teams in League C, due to differing group sizes, the results against the fourth-placed teams are not considered when comparing teams placed first, second, and third in their respective groups.
Criteria for overall ranking After the conclusion of all group matches, the overall league rankings were established as follows: The 16 League A teams are ranked 1st to 16th according to their league rankings. The 16 League B teams are ranked 17th to 32nd according to their league rankings. The League C teams are ranked 33rd onwards according to their league rankings.
The UEFA Women's Nations League overall phase rankings were established after the conclusion of the promotion/relegation play-offs, and were used to determine the starting positions and seeding of the teams in Women's World Cup 2027 qualifying. The order of the teams in the overall phase rankings is based on the overall league rankings, with the following modifications:
The automatically promoted teams are ranked above teams from lower leagues that were promoted after their promotion/relegation matches The automatically relegated teams are ranked below teams from higher leagues that were relegated after their promotion/relegation matches
Schedule Below is the schedule for the 2025 UEFA Women's Nations League. StageRoundDates League phase Draw 7 November 2024 Matchday 1 21 February 2025 Matchday 2 25–26 February 2025 Matchday 3 4 April 2025 Matchday 4 8 April 2025 Matchday 5 30 May 2025 Matchday 6 3 June 2025 Promotion/relegation matches Draw 6 June 2025 First leg22–28 October 2025 Second leg Finals Draw 6 June 2025 Semi-finals (two legs) 20–28 October 2025 Third-place playoff (two legs)26 November – 2 December 2025 Final (two legs)
Seeding
The leagues were formed according to the Women's European Qualifiers overall phase rankings, and were seeded into pots based on the same rankings.
Gibraltar and Liechtenstein entered the tournament for the first time, having not entered in the previous edition. This was both women's teams' first official competitive international tournament.Gibraltar Women's National Team entered into UEFA Nations League Gibraltar Broadcasting Corporation. 22 October 2024. Retrieved 23 October 2024.
Russia were suspended indefinitely from all UEFA and FIFA competitions on 28 February 2022 due to their country's invasion of Ukraine. On 30 September 2024, UEFA confirmed they would not be permitted to enter this edition of the Women's Nations League, or to enter 2027 Women's World Cup qualifying.
San Marino did not submit an entry into the competition.
+KeyPromoted after UEFA Women's Euro 2025 qualifyingRelegated after UEFA Women's Euro 2025 qualifying +League APotTeam112342567839101112413141516+League BPotTeam117181920221222324325262728429303132+League CPotTeam1333435363738239404142434434546474849504515253
+ Did not enter Team Rank —+ Banned from entering Team Rank –
Draw The draw took place on 7 November 2024 at 13:00 CET in Nyon, Switzerland.
Teams were drawn from their seeding pots into groups for each league, starting with League C, then League B, and finally League A. In each league, all teams were drawn from Pot 1 and assigned to groups in ascending order until the pot was empty, then the draw continued with Pot 2 and so on.
For political reasons, Armenia and Azerbaijan, as well as Belarus and Ukraine, could not be drawn in the same group. Due to excessive travel restrictions, Kazakhstan could not be drawn into a group containing more than one of Andorra, Faroe Islands, Gibraltar, or Malta.
League A
Group A1
Group A2
Group A3
Group A4
Nations League Finals
The pairings and order of legs were determined via an open draw on 6 June 2025.
Bracket
League B
Group B1
Group B2
Group B3
Group B4
Ranking of third-placed teams
League C
Group C1
Group C2
Group C3
Group C4
Group C5
Group C6
Ranking of second-placed teams Due to differing group sizes in League C, results against fourth-placed teams were not considered when comparing second-placed teams.
Promotion/relegation matches
The pairings for the promotion/relegation matches were determined via a draw on 6 June 2025.
League A vs League B
League B vs League C
Overall ranking
Overall league rankings
At the conclusion of the league phase, the results of each team's league rankings were used to calculate the overall league rankings, according to the ranking criteria.
+ Key
Overall phase rankings
After the conclusion of the promotion/relegation play-offs, the overall league rankings were adjusted according to the ranking criteria to establish the UEFA Women's Nations League overall phase rankings, which were used to determine the starting positions and seeding of the teams in Women's World Cup 2027 qualifying.
+ Key Promoted after the season Relegated after the season * Participated in promotion/relegation play-offs
Top goalscorers
Below are goalscorers lists for all leagues, promotion/relegation matches, and finals:
References