Fifa members voted on the bids at their congress in Moscow
The 2026 World Cup will be held in the United States, Canada and Mexico after their joint bid beat Morocco's proposal to host it.
The 'United 2026' bid was selected by Fifa member nations, winning 134 votes compared to 65 for Morocco.
The 2026 tournament will be the biggest World Cup ever held - with 48 teams playing 80 matches over 34 days.
"Football is the only victor. We are all united in football," US Soccer president Carlos Cordeiro said.
"Thank you so, so much for this incredible honour. Thank you for entrusting us with this privilege."
Of the 211 Fifa member nations, 200 cast a vote at the 68th Fifa Congress in Moscow on Wednesday, with the winning bid needing a majority of 104.
Canada, Mexico, Morocco and the US were exempt, while Ghana was absent after the country's government said it had disbanded its football association amid allegations of "widespread" corruption.
Three US territories - Guam, the US Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico - were among the other member nations to not vote.
Both Mexico (1970 and 1986) and the United States (1994) have previously hosted World Cups.
Canada staged the Women's World Cup in 2015.
The bidding process
Since the 2018 and 2022 tournaments were awarded to Russia and Qatar respectively in December 2010, widespread corruption has been exposed in the global game, including allegations of bribery and payment for votes.
A BBC Panorama documentary claimed Qatar spent £117m on their successful bid for the 2022 World Cup - the first to be held in winter - while former Fifa president Sepp Blatter suggested there was an agreement in place for Russia to host the 2018 tournament before the vote took place.
Prominent figures, including Blatter, have since been indicted.
As a result Fifa - under the presidency of Gianni Infantino - promised a "more open and transparent" vote to decide the 2026 World Cup host.
It was decided that Fifa's 22-strong executive committee would no longer vote on behalf of the membership, as had occurred previously,
Instead, the two bids made a final 15-minute presentation in front of congress before the Fifa member nations cast their votes.
Media playback is not supported on this device Three countries react to getting the World Cup 2026 bid
The winning bid
The 'United' World Cup will generate $14bn (£10.3bn) in revenue and make an $11bn (£8.1bn) profit for Fifa, says Cordeiro.
Of the 16 host cities, 10 will be in the United States while the remainder will be split evenly between Canada and Mexico.
Sixty matches will take place in the US, while Canada and Mexico will host 10 games each.
The final will be held at the 84,953-capacity MetLife Stadium, which is home to NFL sides the New York Giants and the New York Jets.
The distance between the most northern host city (Edmonton) and the most southern (Mexico City) is almost 3,000 miles, which compares to 1,900 miles at this month's tournament in Russia.
The tournament will mark the first time a World Cup has been shared by three host nations.
The 1994 World Cup, staged by the US, had the highest average attendance in the tournament's history, while Mexico was the first nation to host the event twice.
In 2017, Fifa said the host nation for the 2026 World Cup would qualify automatically and its slot would be taken from the allocation of its confederation.
However, Fifa president Gianni Infantino said the issue of all three hosts - Canada, USA and Mexico - being given automatic slots is still to be decided, with discussions set to take place in the next few weeks.
The 23 World Cup 2026 venues in Canada, the United States and Mexico - 10 of the 17 USA cities will be used
What they said
US Soccer president Carlos Cordeiro: "Hosting the 2026 Fifa World Cup is a rare and important moment to demonstrate that we are all truly united through sport.
"We are humbled by the trust our colleagues in the Fifa family have put in our bid, strengthened by the unity between our three countries and the Concacaf region and excited by the opportunity we have to put football on a new and sustainable path for generations to come."
Morocco Football Federation president Fouzi Lekjaa: "I wish to congratulate Fifa for the conduct of this process and congratulate the president for what he has done in order to move things towards more transparency and more inclusion.
"I would like to reaffirm the determination of my country to continue to work for football and realise one day our dream to host the World Cup in Morocco."
The Football Association (FA): "We congratulate the USA, Canada and Mexico on winning the bid to host the 2026 Fifa World Cup. Both bids were of a very high quality and we welcome the fact that the bidding process was both open and transparent.
"We cast our vote for the 'United' bid as we believe the independent technical assessment made its advantages very clear. However, it is important to note that both bids were deemed to have met the hosting requirements and a tournament in Morocco, close to Europe and in a country that loves football, had a great deal for English football fans to be excited about."
Fifth time unlucky
Five times they have bid, and five times they have been overlooked - Morocco are perhaps destined to never host a World Cup.
Morocco's bid faced unwanted attention when Fifa secretary general Fatma Samoura was the subject of an investigation into an alleged conflict of interest.
Members of Fifa's World Cup bid evaluation task force said she had an undeclared family link with Morocco 2026 bid ambassador El Hadji Diouf.
She was cleared of any wrongdoing and dismissed the claims as "laughable" and "unfortunate".
The same evaluation task force later expressed concerns over stadiums, the availability of accommodation, and the travel network, despite ratifying their proposals.
Nine of the 14 stadiums included in Morocco's bid were yet to be built, while the remaining five required "significant renovation or upgrading".
But bid chief Hicham el Amrani said he was confident the country's infrastructure "could deliver" and made play of the North African nation's position, nine miles from the southern tip of Spain - dubbing it a "European" World Cup.
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The 2026 tournament will be one of firsts. It will be the first time the World Cup is hosted by three countries, the first time it has a 48-team format, up from 32 teams, and it was the first time the vote was decided by FIFA’s entire membership. Of the tournament’s 80 matches, 10 will be in Canada, 10 in Mexico and 60 in the United States — including the final, at MetLife Stadium in the New York City suburb of East Rutherford, N.J.
The last time the men’s World Cup was held in North America was when the United States hosted in 1994. It was held in Mexico in 1970 and 1986. Canada has never hosted.
North American bid leaders have been on the road since April, visiting voting nations. The lobbying paid off as they rode to victory on a wave of support from the Americas, Europe and Asia, plus a few votes poached from Africa, whose regional soccer president, Ahmed Ahmed, issued a bombastic plea to his members on Tuesday, urging them to vote for Morocco as a symbol of African unity.
“From a few days ago, we always had a clear path to victory,” Cordeiro said. Still, even he could not have believed some of the support that ended up coming the way of the North Americans, notably a vote from Russia.
After the months of meetings and arm-twisting, a campaign that began last August when Morocco jumped into the race (on the final day countries could do so), ended in an instant: with electronic vote totals suddenly flashing onto a giant screen.
And just a few hours after Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, welcomed the world to celebrate the 2018 World Cup, American soccer leaders took to the same stage to tell the world to celebrate with them in 2026.
The victory spared U.S. Soccer a second stunning defeat in less than a year; the United States men’s team is missing the World Cup this summer, its first absence since 1986. The American federation spent more than $6 million — out of a combined budget of about $8 million — to bring the World Cup back to North America, the culmination of an idea set in motion in a Vancouver restaurant seven years ago, according to Victor Montagliani, the head of Concacaf, the regional governing body.
As delegates surged to congratulate the winners, Montagliani took a deep breath to consider the journey that secured soccer’s biggest prize. He said he had conceived of the plan while he was Canada’s soccer head, and managed to persuade Sunil Gulati, then the U.S. soccer president, to join in a potential joint offer after Canada staged a successful women’s World Cup in 2015. Gulati, who was replaced by Cordeiro in February, first secured the support of the chairman of the influential Mexican television channel Televisa and finally the Mexican soccer federation.
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“I was so nervous sitting up there because you don’t have control over anything,” said Montagliani, who was seated on a raised dais with FIFA’s senior membership as the decision was announced. “It’s like your little baby — but it was a great team effort by everyone involved. There’s nothing quite like the World Cup.”
The North Americans had offered FIFA’s member associations a ready-made World Cup; the 23 stadiums they offered as potential hosts are built, as is most of the infrastructure the expanded 48-team tournament will need: training sites, hotels, airports, rail lines.
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And, like Morocco, the North Americans also had the full support of their governments. The nations’ so-called United Bid was a rare topic on which the presidents of the three countries found common cause, and the United States government, including President Trump, had mounted a stealthy shadow campaign to try to win over FIFA and its member federations.
The North American bid’s signature selling point, however, was delivered in a language FIFA members long have understood: revenue. The North Americans promised FIFA an $11 billion profit — a staggering sum that could mean as much as $50 million for each national association.
Morocco, which pledged a profit less than half as large as its rivals, criticized the focus on money over soccer until the bitter end.
“The United Bid is proposing an offer that is mainly a business proposal for football,” one Moroccan official, Moncef Belkhayat, said on Monday. “Their offer is based on dollars, on profit, while Morocco is offering an offer that is based on passion for football, for development of football — not only in Morocco, but also in Africa.”
After the defeat, African officials gathered around their president, Ahmed, as he scanned the list of countries that did not vote for Morocco.
“We are hurting: You look at the countries from your continent that didn’t vote and you have blood Arab countries that supported a different nation, that’s where it hurts more,” said Daniel Amokachi, a Nigerian former soccer player.
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Yet there were serious concerns about Morocco’s candidacy from the beginning, notably how the North African nation could cope with the massive undertaking of hosting the first 48-team World Cup. It would have needed to spend billions of dollars to build nine stadiums and to significantly renovate five others, and do it all in eight years — four fewer than the 12 FIFA gave to Qatar, which still has not finished the job of getting ready for the 2022 World Cup.
Then there were the hotels, the highways, the rail links and the facilities to host a tournament set to bring more than 1,100 players and millions of fans to North Africa; all would have needed to be built, at a cost of billions more.
Morocco, which has now lost five efforts to stage the tournament, vowed to press ahead and build the projects it presented to voters. “We managed this bid with a sporting spirit and we will continue our path in the same vein,” said Moulay Hafid Elalamy, its millionaire bid chairman.
The end result was far more emphatic than it may have appeared in the last-gasp votes that played into the early hours of Wednesday morning. At one point, both bid teams arrived at the hotel housing Asian delegates shortly before 1 a.m., as rumors began to spread that the Moroccans might have gained some ground. They were sparked by an announcement by the Netherlands soccer federation that it would back Morocco, contrary to what officials had told the Americans as recently as last week.
The victory will also be celebrated privately by FIFA’s leadership, which had given indications it preferred the surety and likely billions delivered by taking the tournament back to North America. A technical report, which FIFA’s president, Gianni Infantino, repeatedly told voters to read, scored the winning bid far higher than Morocco’s offer, which FIFA inspectors said had several risk factors. Infantino’s No. 2, Fatma Samoura, issued the same reminder just before voting got underway.
Infantino, who announced his plans to stand for a second term at an election next year, has been on a drive to raise the funds he needs to make good on promises to drastically increase the amount of funding he can deliver to national soccer federations, the only voting constituency in the presidential election.
Cordeiro said the Americans also spoke to members about how a World Cup hosted by the North Americans would lead to a cash windfall for everyone. In Scandinavia last month, he said each federation could get as much as an extra $50 million should the 2026 World Cup meet its $11 billion profit target. “Let that sink in,” he told them.
By Wednesday, it was clear the message had been heard loud and clear.
The United States, Canada and Mexico have won the right to host the 2026 World Cup after a vote of Fifa delegates in Moscow.
A joint bid by the three North American countries under the name ’United’ saw off the challenge of a rival proposal from Morocco, winning over two-thirds of the vote.
The United bid persuaded 134 of the 203 delegates eligible to vote at the 68th annual Fifa congress, which was held on the eve of the 2018 tournament in Russia.
Morocco hoped to become the second African nation to host the tournament but earned just 65 votes on Wednesday and suffered defeat in a World Cup bidding process for the fifth time. One delegate, representing Iran, voted ‘none of the above’.
World Cup 2018 official kits 51 show all World Cup 2018 official kits 1/51 World Cup 2018 kits The kits for the 2018 World Cup have started to be released ... but which one is your favourite? Getty 2/51 Russia home They say: A clean design in red and white, inspired by the 1988 USSR jersey.
Our verdict: Literally cannot muster up the enthusiasm to write anymore words about this snorefest. Adidas 3/51 Russia away They say: A smart strip in white and blue with subtle geometric pattern.
Our verdict: Now that’s more like it! Big mistake not making this the home kit in our ever so humble opinion. Adidas 4/51 Saudi Arabia home and away Both home and away kits yet to be released. Will be supplied by Nike. Will probably feature a bit of green. AFP/Getty Images 5/51 Egypt home They say: A ‘sleek and modern’ kit with sublimated check pattern on the front and white Adidas strips down the sides.
Our verdict: Decent. Would make a nice Manchester United kit. Adidas 6/51 Uruguay home They say: A clean design in ‘silver lake blue’, with an ‘engineered jacquard graphic’ in the middle of the jersey.
Our verdict: What’s Spanish for ‘horrific v neck’? Puma 7/51 Portugal home They say: The red base from Portugal’s Euro 2016 triumph is retained, with Nike introducing ‘gold-metallic trim’ and a green collar.
Our verdict: Yup, it’s a template. But that doesn’t stop it from looking smart. Nike 8/51 Portugal away They say: An all-white design inspired by the country’s naval history.
Our verdict: Cleaner than Kim Woodburn’s kitchen. Lovely stuff. Nike 9/51 Spain home They say: Made by Adidas and inspired by the classic 1994 home strip.
Our verdict: GET IT ON MY TORSO NOW. Getty Images 10/51 Spain away They say: Another 1980s inspired kit. ‘Halo blue’ with bright orange trim.
Our verdict: It’s … okay. Not a patch on that smashing home effort, mind. Adidas 11/51 Morocco home and away Both kits, to be produced by Adidas, are yet to be released. Valery Sharifulin/TASS 12/51 Iran home and away Same again – to be produced by Adidas but yet to be released. Hurry up lads! Getty Images 13/51 France home They say: A traditional look with blue jersey, white shorts and red socks.
Our verdict: Another template. Another sexy kit. Damn you, Nike! Nike 14/51 France away They say: White shirt, blue sleeves and white socks – with a distinct graphic print.
Our verdict: Why couldn’t Nike have given this to England?! As smooth as Zinedine Zidane’s shiny bald head. Nike 15/51 Australia home and away Move along, nothing to see here. Nike’s Aussie kits are yet to be released. Getty 16/51 Peru home They say: The last ever Umbro kit for the country – Marathon Sports take over next year.
Our verdict: You don’t get more traditional than this. A proper football kit for proper football men. You can shove your xG up your a***, etc. Umbro 17/51 Denmark home and away Yet to be released. But they’re to be manufactured by Hummel. So they’re bound to be good. Action Plus via Getty Images 18/51 Argentina home They say: A classic effort that draws inspiration from the 1993 Copa America strip, coincidentally the last time Argentina won a major title.
Our verdict: A stylish strip befitting of little Leo Messi. Top drawer. Adidas 19/51 Argentina away They say: Black jerseys with neat white and blue trim, white shorts, black socks.
Our verdict: Woof. Coming to a five-a-side court near you very soon. Adidas 20/51 Iceland home They say: An Errea produced kit which incorporates the traditional home colours of blue, red and white.
Our verdict: Nice, if a little bit bargain basement. Errea 21/51 Iceland away They say: The reverse of the home shirt.
Our verdict: Yes, we can confirm that this is the exact reverse of the home shirt. Errea 22/51 Croatia home They say: Nike offer a new interpretation of the team’s iconic checker design, with much larger checks than usual.
Our verdict: Will look great on Luka Modric if he can keep himself out of prison long enough to wear it. 23/51 Croatia away They say: The same template as the home shirt, but with a black and dark blue colour scheme.
Our verdict: Very, very nice. A slightly gothic interpretation of the home shirt we all know and love. The football kit equivalent of Late Night Hollyoaks. 24/51 Nigeria home They say: An eclectic combination of bright green, white and black in an especially bold design.
Our verdict: Outstanding. Sensational. Sublime. The nicest kit at this year’s World Cup and destined to be worn at Boiler Room sessions from now until 2046. Nike 25/51 Nigeria away They say: A clean design in dark green with subtle zigzag print.
Our verdict: Oh dear, clearly Nike used all their budget on the home shirt. About as exciting as a Songs of Praise marathon. Nike 26/51 They say: A traditional effort with subtle zigzag pattern.
Our verdict: Why change a winning formula? Bright, bold and very much Brazil. Nike 27/51 Brazil away They say: Based on the same design as the home shirt. Royal blue with a unique star pattern covering the front.
Our verdict: Yeah, fine, okay. Nike 28/51 Switzerland home and away Not released yet, soz. Getty 29/51 Costa Rica home and away The bad news: the kits haven’t been released yet. The good news: they’re being made by New Balance, so will be peng. Getty Images 30/51 Serbia away They say: White with red trim, with the nation’s flag running down the centre.
Our verdict: Very difficult to criticise. But we'll have a go: the collar is a bit naff. Other than that, no complaints. Now be on your way, Serbia away. Puma 31/51 Germany home They say: White, black and inspired by the iconic 1990 strip.
Our verdict: You’ve already seen this, and you already love it. If only it featured the colours of the German flag, though… Adidas 32/51 Germany away They say: The first green German jersey since Euro 2012, inspired by the 1994 away effort.
Our verdict: It's Adidas. It's green. It's great. Let me wear you, Germany away. Adidas 33/51 Mexico home They say: Manufactured by Adidas, featuring the country’s traditional green colour with white applications.
Our verdict: Yum. Adidas 34/51 Mexico away They say: Draws inspiration from Mexico’s kits of the 1950s. White with a green, white and red chest stripe.
Our verdict: Looks a bit like something Roger Federer would wear to win the Australian Open. And we’re very much okay with that. Adidas 35/51 Sweden home They say: The traditional yellow and blue, with a subtle jacquard pattern on the front.
Our verdict: Nothing to write home about, to be honest. Unless you’re writing the solitary word ‘BORING’, that is. Adidas 36/51 Sweden away They say: Adidas claim the away kit features ‘a sleek design in blue and yellow’.
Our verdict: That subtle pattern is very nice. One of the better ‘plain Jane’ kits to be worn in Russia. Adidas 37/51 South Korea home They say: A classic red design with dark blue shorts and red socks.
Our verdict: Boring. Plain. Routine. Run-of-the-mill. Humdrum, Dreary. Banal. Unoriginal. Spiritless. Insipid. Etc. Nike 38/51 South Korea away They say: Predominantly white, with a bold blue and red graphic print subtly inspired by a tiger pattern and the Taegeuk symbol.
Our verdict: Much better, although it does look a bit like a crayon wielding toddler has been let loose on the new England shirt. Which nevertheless remains a huge improvement. Nike 39/51 Belgium home They say: A bold design that takes inspiration from the iconic 1984 top.
Our verdict: Cracking. Atones for those atrocious Burrda efforts they’ve been palmed off with at the last few tournaments. Adidas 40/51 Belgium away They say: Yellow and black with a slight all-over graphic print.
Our verdict: Yet another sublime Adidas away kit. *Wolfwhistles* Adidas 41/51 Panama home and away Yet to be released. AFP/Getty Images 42/51 Tunisia home They say: White with red crew-neck collar and cuffs, and a dotted gradient graphic.
Our verdict: If this football shirt was a British sporting personality, it would be Steve Davis. Uhlsport 43/51 Tunisia away They say: The Tunisia 2018 World Cup away shirt is red with white details.
Our verdict: If this football shirt was a British sporting personality, it would be Steve Davis. Uhlsport 44/51 England home They say: Manufactured by Nike, with a white base with blue for logos and a modern knit pattern on the front.
Our verdict: About as inspiring as Iain Duncan Smith. This country really is going to the dogs. Nike 45/51 England away They say: Red all over with a subtle St George’s Cross motif across the front.
Our verdict: It’s red. It has a bit of a pattern thing going on across the front. We’ve already forgotten about it. Next. Nike 46/51 Poland home and away To be made by Nike, but yet to be released. Getty 47/51 Senegal home and away To be made by Puma, but yet to be released. IT'S TOO LATE FOR OUR POLL NOW, SENEGAL. Getty 48/51 Colombia home They say: Produced by Adidas with a traditional colour scheme, inspired by the iconic home shirts worn in the 1970s and 80s.
Our verdict: Yessssssss. If it’s good enough for James Rodriguez it’s good enough for us. Adidas 49/51 Colombia away They say: Predominantly royal blue, with bright orange trim and a jazzy pattern down one side of the shirt.
Our verdict: Very solid. Colombia right up there with Germany for the best pair of shirts in the business. Adidas 50/51 Japan home They say: According to Adidas: ‘the shirt’s bespoke look and graphic takes inspiration from traditional samurai armour’.
Our verdict: Really lovely kit. Deserves better than the inevitable group stage exit. Adidas 51/51 Japan away They say: An understated all-white kit with subtle grey trim.
Our verdict: Adidas deliver a top-draw kit yet again. A lovely way to round off the gallery. Thanks for reading! Adidas
2026 will therefore see the World Cup return to North America for the first time since 1994, when the United States hosted alone. Mexico has staged the World Cup twice previously, in 1970 and 1986, while Canada hosted the Women’s World Cup in 2015.
The 2026 tournament will also be the second World Cup hosted in more than one country, following Japan and South Korea’s joint effort in 2002. Canada and Mexico will stage just 10 games each, however. The United States will host 60 matches in total, including all games from the quarter-finals onwards.
Carlos Cordeiro, the president of US Soccer and one of the United bid’s figureheads, told the Fifa congress: “It’s a bit emotional for us today. Thank you so, so very much for this incredible honour. Thank you for entrusting us with the privilege of hosting the FIFA World Cup in 2026.
“The beautiful game transcends borders and cultures. Football today is the only victor. And in that spirit we wish all Russian hosts and all the teams competing here the very best of luck.”
The United bid was considered the front-runner from the start of the process in 2017 and expects its tournament to generate approximately $14bn (£10.3bn) in revenue, including an $11bn (£8.1bn) profit for Fifa. This year’s World Cup in Russia, by comparison, expects a turnover of $6.1bn (£4.58bn).
Morocco’s 2026 proposal gained momentum as the process went on but logistical concerns regarding stadiums, accommodation and transportation hung over the bid from the start.
Fifa’s inspection task force rated hosting a World Cup in Morocco as “high risk” last month, awarding the country a rating of 2.7 out of 5. The North American bid, meanwhile, received a score of 4 out of 5 and was deemed to be a low risk proposal. Delegates at Wednesday’s congress were reminded of the findings by Fifa’s general secretary Fatma Samoura shortly before voting commenced.
Fouzi Lekjaa, the president of the Royal Moroccan Football Federation, vowed that the country would not give up on its ‘dream’ of a Moroccan World Cup. This latest failed bid followed others for the 1994, 1998, 2006 and 2010 tournaments.
“I wish to congratulate Fifa for the conduct of this process and congratulate the president for what he has done in order to move things towards more transparency and more inclusion,” he said.
“I would like to reaffirm the determination of my country to continue to work for football and realise one day our dream to host the World Cup in Morocco.”
Donald Trump’s policy on immigration, including his promise to build a wall along the US-Mexico border, made a joint bid involving the two countries politically sensitive. In April, the US president’s veiled threat towards countries who might vote against the bid led Fifa to refer to guidelines on political interference.
Trump congratulated the United bid on securing the tournament via social media. “The U.S., together with Mexico and Canada, just got the World Cup. Congratulations – a great deal of hard work,” he tweeted.
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