Culture
World Cup 2026: The biggest tournament yet and a New York final
The United States, Canada and Mexico will host the first 48-team edition of the FIFA World Cup in 2026 — and now we know where all 104 matches in the biggest knockout tournament in soccer history will be taking place.
New York/New Jersey will stage the final on July 19, 2026, beating out early favorites Los Angeles and Dallas to land the showpiece event in men’s global soccer.
The 16 host cities across three countries did not know which matches they would be allocated until Gianni Infantino, president of world governing body FIFA, made the announcements in a live televised show on Sunday, saying the 2026 tournament would be “the biggest spectacle the world has ever seen”.
Where will the three host nations play their group matches?
The U.S. men’s national team, Mexico and Canada have all been granted automatic places at the tournament. The remaining 45 teams still need to qualify.
“There’s going to be 48 countries that are deeply invested in how their team does at the World Cup,” USMNT coach Gregg Berhalter said after the announcement. “It’s going to be a new format and exciting for a lot of people.”
Mexico will kick off in the World Cup’s opening match at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City on Thursday, June 11, then play in Guadalajara on June 18 and then back in Mexico City on June 24.
The USMNT will start in Los Angeles on June 12, then head north to Seattle on June 19 before returning to Los Angeles on June 26.
USMNT’s Christian Pulisic (Howard Smith/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images for USSF)
Canada will play their first match in Toronto on Friday, June 12, and then have their second and third group matches in Vancouver on June 18 and 24.
Who were the winners and losers from the announcement?
Well, New York/New Jersey was the big winner, with momentum having appeared to have gathered behind Dallas’ bid to host the final in recent weeks. Dallas, though, can point to hosting the most matches of any city during the tournament.
Overall Dallas Stadium will host the MOST matches out of any host city with 9 @FIFAWorldCup™ matches 🌎
🇺🇸 🇨🇦 🇲🇽 #WeAre26 l #WeAreDallas pic.twitter.com/IxY2rPHi8L
— FIFA World Cup 26™ Dallas (@FWC26Dallas) February 4, 2024
The United States, as expected, is hosting all the knockout matches from the quarterfinals onwards but the USMNT will have to progress beyond the group stage to have a chance for fans outside of the West Coast to see them play.
Canada’s 10 group stage games will be split down the middle between the two host cities, Toronto and Vancouver. Both cities will also host one last-32 game while Vancouver will play host to a round of 16 game.
Mexico will open the tournament but has only 13 of the 104 matches, and only three knockout matches.
How will it work?
The men’s World Cup has featured 32 teams since 1998 but it’s going large for 2026 with an additional knockout round and 104 matches rather than 64.
The 2026 tournament will feature 12 groups of four teams. The top two sides from each group will advance to the first knockout stage alongside the eight best-performing third-placed sides — 32 teams in total.
From there there will be a round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals and the final.
The competition will be staged across 16 stadiums, with the U.S. cities New York, Dallas, Miami, Kansas City, Houston, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Seattle, San Francisco and Boston being joined by Mexican venues Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara, alongside Canadian cities Vancouver and Toronto.
GO DEEPER
Everything you need to know about the 2026 World Cup
Who got what?
AT&T Stadium (Dallas)
Capacity (according to bid book): 92,967
Matches: 9
Breakdown: Dallas missed out on the final but did get the most matches of any city — five group-stage matches, two in the round of 32, a last 16 and a semifinal.
The AT&T Stadium will host more matches than any other stadium at the 2026 World Cup (Matthew Ashton – AMA/Getty Images)
MetLife Stadium (New York/New Jersey)
Capacity: 87,157
Matches: 8
Breakdown: Five group matches, a round of 32, a round of 16 and then the one they all wanted… the men’s World Cup final.
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Mercedes-Benz Stadium (Atlanta)
Capacity: 75,000
Matches: 8
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches, a round of 32, a round of 16 and the second semifinal.
SoFi Stadium (Los Angeles)
Capacity: 70,240
Matches: 8
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches, two in the round of 32 and one quarterfinal.
(Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)
Hard Rock Stadium (Miami)
Capacity: 67,518
Matches: 7
Breakdown: Four group-stage matches, a round of 32, a quarterfinal and the third-place playoff.
Gillette Stadium (Boston)
Capacity: 70,000
Matches: 7
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches, a round of 32 and a quarterfinal.
NRG Stadium (Houston)
Capacity: 72,220
Matches: 7
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches, one round of 32 and a round of 16.
BC Place (Vancouver)
Capacity: 54,500
Matches: 7
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches (including two of Canada’s group matches), one round of 32 and a round of 16.
Arrowhead Stadium (Kansas City)
Capacity: 76,640
Matches: 6
Breakdown: Four group-stage matches, one round of 32 and a quarterfinal.
Lumen Field (Seattle)
Capacity: 69,000
Matches: 6
Breakdown: Four group-stage matches, a round of 32 and a round of 16.
BMO Field (Toronto)
Capacity: 45,736 (expanding from current 30,000 for the tournament)
Matches: 6
Breakdown: Five group matches (including co-host Canada’s opening game) and a round of 32
Levi’s Stadium (San Francisco Bay Area)
Capacity: 70,909
Matches: 6
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches and one round of 32.
Lincoln Financial Field (Philadelphia)
Capacity: 69, 328
Matches: 6
Breakdown: Five group-stage matches and a round of 16 on July 4 — the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Estadio Azteca (Mexico City)
Capacity: 87,523
Matches: 5
Breakdown: The opening match on June 11, featuring co-hosts Mexico; two more group matches, a round of 32 match and a round of 16.
Estadio Akron (Guadalajara)
Capacity: 48,071
Matches: 4
Breakdown: Four group matches only.
Estadio BBVA (Monterrey)
Capacity: 53,460
Matches: 4
Breakdown: Three group-stage matches and a round of 16.
What else do I need to know?
If you like tournament football and you live in North America, you’re in the right place.
The U.S. will host the Copa America in June and July this year, with 16 teams vying to win the final in Miami on July 14.
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Complete Copa America schedule
(Top photo: Eva Marie Uzcategui – FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images)
Welcome to Lit Trivia, the Book Review’s regular quiz about books, authors and literary culture. This week’s challenge tests your memory of books that made huge impacts on society after they were published — some of them even spurring changes to American laws. In the five multiple-choice questions below, tap or click on the answer you think is correct. After the last question, you’ll find links to the books if you’d like to do further reading.
Where do you turn when you need advice? A chatbot? A life coach? A wise and trusted friend?
How about a poet? Poets may not be famous for making the best life choices, but because they subject the mess of human existence to the discipline of language, they can be as helpful as any therapist or mentor.
Good poets know the rules and when to break them, which is something they can teach the rest of us.
To wit:
Giving advice is a peculiar literary undertaking. It flourishes in certain popular genres — graduation speeches, newspaper columns, country and western songs and poems like this one — but what, in these contexts, is it really for?
I’m thinking of situations when you don’t urgently need help but nonetheless enjoy reading answers to questions you may not have thought to ask. What interests you isn’t the content of the advice — you could get all the life hacks you want from A.I. — so much as the voice of the person dispensing it.
Wendy Cope is an English poet, born in 1945, who has been a fixture of her country’s literary scene since the 1980s. More recently, her short, buoyant poem “The Orange” has been widely memed online, bringing her to the attention of new readers beyond Britain.
Cope favors rhyme, meter, brisk jokes and tart aperçus. She addresses romance, friendship and the petty absurdities of modern life with disarming good humor. The last line of “The Orange” is “I love you. I’m glad I exist.” Somehow she makes it the opposite of cringe.
This isn’t the kind of poetry you would describe as “confessional.” And yet …
Question 1/7
Stop, if the car is going “clunk”
Or if the sun has made you blind.
Don’t answer e–mails when you’re drunk.
Tap a word above to fill in the highlighted blank.Want to learn this poem by heart? We’ll help.
Fill in the missing words below. You can always refer to the reading by A.O. Scott and full
text above.Let’s start with the first stanza.
A strong sense of place can deeply influence a story, and in some cases, the setting can even feel like a character itself. This week’s literary geography quiz highlights places where authors were born (or lived) that later became locations in their books. To play, just make your selection in the multiple-choice list and the correct answer will be revealed. At the end of the quiz, you’ll find links to the works if you’d like to do further reading.
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