The 2025–26 UEFA Europa League will be the 55th season of Europe's secondary club

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 ...

tournament organised by

UEFA The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; ; ) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs football, futsal and beach soccer, beach football in Europe and the List of transcontinental countries#A ...

, and the 17th season since it was renamed from the UEFA Cup to 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 ...

. The

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

will be played on 20 May 2026 at Beşiktaş Stadium in

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

, Turkey. This will be the second season played under a new format, which replaced the 32-team group stage with a 36-team league phase. Tottenham Hotspur are the reigning champions, but will not be able to defend their title as the winner of the Europa League automatically qualifies for the Champions League league phase, and the new format does not allow clubs to transfer from the Champions League into the Europa League from the league phase onwards.

Association team allocation

A total of 78 teams from between 33 and 40 of the 55

member associations are expected to participate in the 2025–26 UEFA Europa League. Among them, 33 associations have teams directly qualifying for the Europa League, while for the other 12 associations that do not have any teams directly qualifying may have teams playing after being transferred from the Champions League. The association ranking based on the UEFA association coefficients is used to determine the number of participating teams for each association: *The title holders of the Conference League were given an entry in the Europa League (if they did not qualify for the Champions League or Europa League via league position). *Associations 1–12 each have two teams. *Associations 13–33 (except

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

) each have one team. *31 teams eliminated from the 2025–26 UEFA Champions League qualifying phase and play-off round will be transferred to the Europa League.

Association ranking

For the 2025–26 UEFA Europa League, the associations are allocated places according to their 2024 UEFA association coefficients, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from 2019–20 to 2023–24. Apart from the allocation based on the association coefficients, associations may have additional teams participating in the Europa League, as noted below: * – Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Champions League * – Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Conference League

Distribution

The information here reflects the ongoing suspension of Russia in European football, and so the following changes to the default access list have been made: *The cup winners of association 16 (Denmark) will enter the second qualifying round instead of the first qualifying round. As the Conference League title holders ( Chelsea) qualified for the Champions League league phase via their domestic league's standard berth allocation, the following changes to the default access list have been made: * Dinamo Zagreb, as the club with the highest club coefficient that would otherwise have entered the qualifying phase or play-off round, will enter the league phase instead of the first qualifying round. *The cup winners of association 34 (Finland) will enter the first qualifying round, instead of the Conference League second qualifying round.

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round: *CON: Conference League title holders *CW: Cup winners *3rd, 4th, 5th, etc.: League position of the previous season *RL: Winners of the regular league phase *CL: Transferred from the Champions League **CH/LP PO: Losers from the play-off round (Champions/League Path) **CH/LP Q3: Losers from the third qualifying round (Champions/League Path) **CH/LP Q2: Losers from the second qualifying round (Champions/League Path) The third qualifying round is divided into Champions Path (CH) and Main Path (MP).

Round and draw dates

The schedule of the competition is as follows. Matches are scheduled for Thursdays, apart from the final, which takes place on a Wednesday, though exceptionally can take place on Tuesdays or Wednesdays due to scheduling conflicts. One exclusive week will be held where both Wednesday and Thursdays are matchdays, on 24 and 25 September.

Qualifying rounds

First qualifying round

Second qualifying round

Third qualifying round

Play-off round

League phase

The league phase draw for the 2025–26 UEFA Europa League takes place on 29 August 2025. The 36 teams will be divided into four pots of nine teams each based on their UEFA club coefficient. The 36 teams will be manually drawn and then automated software digitally will draw their eight different opponents at random, determining which of their matches will be at home and which ones away. Each team will face two opponents from each of the four pots, one at home and one away. Teams cannot face opponents from their own association, and can only be drawn against a maximum of two sides from the same association. Aston Villa,

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

, Crystal Palace, and Go Ahead Eagles will make their debut appearances since the introduction of the group stage (although Aston Villa had previously appeared in the

UEFA Cup The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

group stage and

had previously appeared in 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 ...

league phase). Furthermore, Crystal Palace and Go Ahead Eagles will make their debut appearances in a major UEFA competition group stage or league phase. As of 25 May 2025, the following teams have qualified for the league phase: Pot 1 :(9) Roma CC: 104.500 :(18)

Porto Porto (), also known in English language, English as Oporto, is the List of cities in Portugal, second largest city in Portugal, after Lisbon. It is the capital of the Porto District and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto c ...

CC: 79.750 :(31)

Lille Lille (, ; ; ; ; ) is a city in the northern part of France, within French Flanders. Positioned along the Deûle river, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Prefectures in F ...

CC: 66.000 :(38) Dinamo Zagreb CC: 56.000 :(40)

Real Betis Real Betis Balompié, known as Real Betis () is a Spanish professional association football, football club based in Seville, Andalusia, Spain. It plays in La Liga, the Spanish football league system, top flight of Spanish football. It plays home ...

CC: 52.250 Pot 1/2 :(46) Aston Villa CC: 47.250 :(51)

Lyon Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...

CC: 43.750 Pots unknown (1/2/3/4) :(74)

SC Freiburg Sport-Club Freiburg e.V., commonly known as SC Freiburg (), is a Football in Germany, German professional football club, based in the city of Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg. It plays in the Bundesliga, having been promoted as champions ...

CC: 28.000 :(new) Crystal Palace CC: 23.039 Pot 2/3/4 :(89)

CC: 19.446 :(new) Celta Vigo CC: 18.890 :(102)

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 ...

CC: 17.226 :(123) Go Ahead Eagles CC: 13.430

Table

Results

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Uefa Europa League 2025-26 2 2

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