ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2026: Overview, Format and Qualifying teams

About The Tournament - T20 World Cup 2026:

The 2026 ICC Men's T20 World Cup will be the tenth edition of the T20 World Cup, a biennial Twenty20 International (T20I) tournament played by men's national teams and organized by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It is planned to be co-hosted by India and India from February - March 2026. In November 2021, the International Cricket Council (ICC) announced that Sri Lanka and India will co-host the 2026 ICC Men's T20 World Cup. This will be the 2nd time for Sri Lanka that they will host a T20 World Cup, and the 3rd time for India that they will host a T20 World Cup. Sri Lanka first hosted the T20 World Cup in 2012 and India hosted in 2016 & 2021. Sri Lanka proposed to host this tournament alone. But due to lack of stadiums in Sri Lanka, International Cricket Council (ICC) decided to co-host with India.

The tournament will be contested by 20 teams like the previous edition. The two host nations and the top eight teams from the previous edition will automatically qualify for the tournament, along with the next two teams in the ICC Men's T20I Team Rankings. The remaining eight teams will be decided via a regional qualification process.

Format:

The 20 qualifying teams will be divided into four groups of five; the top two teams in each group will advance to the Super 8 round. In this stage, the qualifying teams will be split into two groups of four; the top two teams from each group will qualify for the knockout stage, which will consist of two semi-finals and a final.

Qualifying teams:

Sri Lanka and India will directly qualify for the tournament as co-hosts. They will be joined by the top eight teams from the previous edition who get qualified automatically, and since India finished in the top eight in the previous edition, the best three teams (other than the ones already qualified) from the ICC Men's T20I Team Rankings will also qualify for the tournament. The remaining eight teams will be decided by regional qualifiers, consisting of two teams from Africa, Asia, and Europe regions along with one team each from Americas and East Asia-Pacific regions.

India, England, Bangladesh, West Indies, Australia, South Africa, USA, and Afghanistan. Additionally, Sri Lanka qualifies as co-host of the T20 WC 2026 as they didn't qualify to Super-8 stage from the 2024 T20 World Cup. The remaining three spots is taken by Ireland, Newzealand and Pakistan teams as they ranked highest on the ICC T20I rankings as of June 30, 2024. The remaining eight teams will be decided by regional qualifiers, consisting of two teams from Africa, Asia, and Europe regions along with one team each from Americas and East Asia-Pacific regions.

Previous Tournament Winners: