Infantino opens the door to a 2030 World Cup with 64 teams
The FIFA president said the proposal will be analyzed after 2026. The idea, backed by Conmebol, had lost momentum but has now returned to the agenda.
FIFA has once again left open the debate over a possible expansion of the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams. According to Gianni Infantino, the proposal will only be analyzed after 2026, in a context where the 48-team format will remain the basis of the next tournament.
The news changes nothing in the short term for the 2026 World Cup, which will be held in United States, Mexico and Canada, but it does reignite the debate over how big the World Cup will be in the future. The project promoted by Conmebol had lost momentum because of a lack of support, although it returned to the agenda after the FIFA president's comments.
What Infantino said about the next step
According to what was reported in recent hours, Infantino said that the expansion to 64 teams will be “analyzed and discussed” after 2026. The issue will not be resolved immediately and will be left for the period after the tournament to be organized by United States, Mexico and Canada.
That is significant because the upcoming World Cup already represents a major change from the previous format: it will be played with 48 teams, a modification that FIFA itself presents as a key step in the competition's evolution.
The World Cup agenda, between 2026 and 2030
- 2026 World Cup: will be played in United States, Mexico and Canada.
- Current format: it will be 48 teams.
- 2030 World Cup: the idea of taking it to 64 teams has returned to the agenda.
For now, nothing changes for 2026. What has been established is that FIFA will keep the discussion open about the tournament's growth. For the public, that means the biggest World Cup in history may still not be the ceiling.
