The draw for the
2018 FIFA World Cup took place on 1 December 2017 at the
State Kremlin Palace
The State Kremlin Palace (russian: Государственный Кремлёвский Дворец), formerly and unofficially still better known as the Kremlin Palace of Congresses (Кремлёвский Дворец съездов), is a ...
in
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...
, Russia. It determined the group in which each of the 32 qualified national teams would play in at the start of the tournament. The teams were divided into four pots of eight, with one team selected from each pot to form a group.
Unlike previous editions of the World Cup, all pots were determined by each national team's October 2017
FIFA World Ranking
The FIFA Men's World Ranking is a ranking system for men's national teams in association football, led by Brazil . The teams of the men's member nations of FIFA, football's world governing body, are ranked based on their game results with the ...
, with Pot 1 containing the highest-ranked teams, Pot 2 containing the next highest-ranked teams, and so on until Pot 4, containing the lowest ranked teams; in previous editions only one pot containing the highest-ranked teams was determined by rank, with the other three pots determined by continental confederation. The hosts continued to be placed in Pot 1 and treated as a seeded team, and therefore Pot 1 consisted of hosts
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...
and the seven highest-ranked teams that qualified for the tournament.
The draw sequence started with pot 1 and ended with pot 4.
As with previous editions, no group had more than one team from any continental confederation except for
UEFA
Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs f ...
, which had at least one, but no more than two in a group.
Seeding
Teams were seeded using the October 2017
FIFA World Rankings
The FIFA Men's World Ranking is a ranking system for men's national teams in association football, led by Brazil . The teams of the men's member nations of FIFA, football's world governing body, are ranked based on their game results with the ...
(shown in parentheses), which were published on 16 October 2017.
;Notes
* H : Hosts
Final draw
References
{{FIFA World Cup
Seeding
The term seeding and related terms such as seeded are used in several different contexts:
*Sowing, planting seeds in a place or on an object
*Cloud seeding, manipulating cloud formations
*Seeding (computing), a concept in computing and peer-to-pee ...
FIFA World Cup seeding