The 2025–26

DFB-Pokal The DFB-Pokal (), also known as the German Cup in English language, English, is a German knockout Association football, football cup competition held annually by the German Football Association (DFB). Sixty-four teams participate in the competiti ...

will be the 83rd season of the annual German

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

cup competition. Sixty-four teams participate in the competition, including all teams from the previous year's

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany and the highest level of the German football league system. The Bundesliga comprises 18 teams ...

and 2. Bundesliga. The competition will begin on 15 August 2025 with the first of six rounds and will end on 23 May 2026 with the final at the Olympiastadion in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, a nominally neutral venue, which has hosted the final since 1985. The DFB-Pokal is considered the second-most important club title in German football after the Bundesliga championship. The DFB-Pokal is run by the

German Football Association The German Football Association ( ; DFB ) is the governing body of Association football, football, futsal, and beach soccer in Germany. A founding member of both FIFA and UEFA, the DFB has jurisdiction for the German football league system and ...

(DFB).

VfB Stuttgart Verein für Bewegungsspiele Stuttgart 1893 e. V. (), commonly known as VfB Stuttgart (), is a German professional sports club based in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg. The club's Association football, football team is currently part of Germany's f ...

are the defending champions. The winner of the DFB-Pokal earns automatic qualification for the group stage of the 2026–27 edition of the

UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (UEL), usually known simply as the Europa League, is an annual association football, football club competition organised since 1971 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European footb ...

. If they have already qualified for the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

through position in the Bundesliga, then the spot will go to the team in sixth, and the league's

UEFA Conference League The UEFA Conference League (UECL), usually known simply as the Conference League, is an annual football competition organised since 2021 by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European football clubs. It is the thir ...

play-off round spot will go to the team in seventh. The winners will also host the 2026 edition of the

DFL-Supercup The Franz Beckenbauer Supercup or ''German Super Cup'' is a one-off association football, football match in Germany that features the winners of the Bundesliga championship and the DFB-Pokal. The competition is run by the Deutsche Fußball Liga (E ...

at the start of the next season, and will face the champions of the

2025–26 Bundesliga The 2025–26 Bundesliga will be the 63rd season of the Bundesliga, Germany's premier men's football competition. Bayern Munich are the defending champions. The season is scheduled to begin on 22 August 2025 and conclude on 16 May 2026. The fix ...

Participating clubs

The following teams qualified for the competition:

Format

Participation

The DFB-Pokal begins with a round of 64 teams. The 36 teams of the

and 2. Bundesliga, along with the top four finishers of the

3. Liga The 3. Liga is a professional association football league and the third division in Germany. In the German football league system, it is positioned between the 2. Bundesliga and the fourth-tier Regionalliga. The modern 3. Liga was formed for t ...

automatically qualified for the tournament. Of the remaining slots, 21 were given to the cup winners of the regional football associations, the ''

Verbandspokal A Verbandspokal (English: "association cup") is a regional men's association football competition in Germany. There are 21 Verbandspokal competitions which function as qualifying tournaments for the following season's DFB-Pokal, the premier Germ ...

''. The three remaining slots were given to the three regional associations with the most men's teams, which were Bavaria, Lower Saxony and Westphalia. The best-placed amateur team of the

Regionalliga Bayern The Regionalliga Bayern () is the highest association football league in the state of Bavaria () and the Bavarian football league system. It is one of five Regionalligas in German football, the fourth tier of the German football league system, b ...

will be given the spot for Bavaria. For Lower Saxony, the

Lower Saxony Cup The Lower Saxony Cup () is an annual football cup competition, held by the () since 1956. For sponsorship reasons, the official name of the competition is Krombacher-Pokal.3. Liga The 3. Liga is a professional association football league and the third division in Germany. In the German football league system, it is positioned between the 2. Bundesliga and the fourth-tier Regionalliga. The modern 3. Liga was formed for t ...

and

Regionalliga Nord The Regionalliga Nord () is the fourth tier of the German football league system in the states of Lower Saxony, Schleswig-Holstein, Bremen and Hamburg. It is one of five leagues at this level, together with the Regionalliga Bayern, Regionalliga N ...

teams, and the other for amateur teams. The winners of each path qualified. For Westphalia, the spot rotates each season between the best-placed Westphalian team of the

Regionalliga West The Regionalliga West is a German professional football division administered by the German Football Association#Western Germany, Western German Football Association based in Duisburg. It is one of the five German regional football associations. ...

and the best-placed amateur team of the

Oberliga Westfalen The Oberliga Westfalen is the highest level football league in the region of Westphalia, which is part of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The league existed from 1978 to 2008, but was then replaced by the NRW-Liga, a new statewide league. W ...

. For the 2025–26 DFB-Pokal, this spot will be awarded to a team from the Regionalliga. As every team is entitled to participate in local tournaments which qualified for the association cups, every team could in principle compete in the DFB-Pokal. Reserve teams and combined football sections are not permitted to enter, along with no two teams of the same association or corporation.

Draw

The draws for the different rounds are conducted as follows: For the first round, the participating teams were split into two pots of 32 teams each. The first pot contained all teams which qualified through their regional cup competitions, the best four teams of the 3. Liga, and the bottom four teams of the 2. Bundesliga. Every team from this pot was drawn to a team from the second pot, which contained all remaining professional teams (all the teams of the Bundesliga and the remaining fourteen 2. Bundesliga teams). The teams from the first pot were set as the home team in the process. The two-pot scenario will be also applied for the second round, with the remaining 3. Liga and/or amateur team(s) in the first pot and the remaining Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga teams in the other pot. Once again, the 3. Liga and/or amateur team(s) serve as hosts. This time the pots will not have to be of equal size though, depending on the results of the first round. Theoretically, it was even possible that there could be only one pot, if all of the teams from one of the pots from the first round beat all the others in the second pot. Once one pot is empty, the remaining pairings will be drawn from the other pot with the first-drawn team for a match serving as hosts. For the remaining rounds, the draw will be conducted from just one pot. Any remaining 3. Liga and/or amateur team(s) will be the home team if drawn against a professional team. In every other case, the first-drawn team will serve as hosts.

Match rules

Teams meet in one game per round. Matches take place for 90 minutes, with two halves of 45 minutes each. If still tied after regulation, 30 minutes of

extra time Overtime (OT) or extra time (ET) is an additional period of play to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played only if the game is required t ...

will be played, consisting of two periods of 15 minutes each. If the score is still level after this, the match will be decided by a

penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pe ...

. A coin toss will decide who takes the first penalty. A maximum of nine players can be listed on the substitute bench, while a maximum of five substitutions are allowed. However, each team is only given three opportunities to make substitutions, with a fourth opportunity in extra time, excluding substitutions made at half-time, before the start of extra time and at half-time in extra time. From the round of 16 onward, a

video assistant referee The video assistant referee (VAR) is a Assistant referee (association football), match official in association football who assists the referee by reviewing decisions using video footage and providing advice to the referee based on those revi ...

will be appointed for all DFB-Pokal matches. Though technically possible, VAR was not used for home matches of Bundesliga clubs prior to the round of 16 in order to provide a uniform approach to all matches.

Suspensions

If a player receives five yellow cards in the competition, he will then be suspended from the next cup match. Similarly, receiving a second yellow card suspends a player from the next cup match. If a player receives a direct red card, they will be suspended a minimum of one match, but the German Football Association reserves the right to increase the suspension.

International qualification

The winners of the DFB-Pokal earn automatic qualification for the league stage of next year's edition of the

. If they have already qualified for the

through position in the Bundesliga, then the spot will go to the team in sixth place, and the league's

play-off round spot will go to the team in seventh place. The winners will also host the

at the start of the next season, and will face the champions of the previous year's

, unless the same team wins the Bundesliga and the DFB-Pokal, completing a double. In that case, the runners-up of the Bundesliga will take the spot and host instead.

Schedule

All draws will generally be held on a Sunday evening after each round (unless noted otherwise). The rounds of the 2025–26 competition are scheduled as follows:

Matches

''Times up to 26 October 2025 and from 29 March 2026 are CEST (

UTC+2 UTC+02:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +02:00. In ISO 8601, the associated time would be written as 2020-11-08T23:41:45+02:00. As standard time (year-round) Principal cities: Pretoria, Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban, Por ...

). Times from 27 October 2025 to 28 March 2026 are

CET CET or cet may refer to: Places * Cet, Albania * Cet, standard astronomical abbreviation for the constellation Cetus * Colchester Town railway station (National Rail code CET), in Colchester, England Arts, entertainment, and media * Comcast En ...

(

UTC+1 +01:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +01:00. In ISO 8601, the associated time would be written as 2019-02-07T23:28:34+01:00. This time is used in: *Central European Time * West Africa Time * Western European Summer Time **Brit ...

).''

First round

The draw took place on 15 June 2025, with Owen Ansah drawing the matches.

Notes

References

External links

*
DFB-Pokal on kicker.de
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dfb-Pokal 2025-26 2025–26 2025–26 in German football cups

DFB DFB may refer to: Music * Dem Franchize Boyz, an Atlanta hip hop group * Dysfunctional Family BBQ, a New York festival Sport * DFB-Pokal, a football cup competition in Germany Organisations * Furka Steam Railway (), Switzerland * German Footbal ...