2026 UEFA European Under-19 Championship
International football competition
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The 2026 UEFA European Under-19 Championship will be the 23rd edition of the UEFA European Under-19 Championship (73rd edition if the Under-18 and Junior era is also included), the annual international youth football championship organised by UEFA for the men's under-19 national teams of Europe. Wales, which were selected by UEFA on 26 September 2023, will host the tournament.[1][2] A total of 8 teams will play in the tournament, with players born on or after 1 January 2007 eligible to participate.
Same as previous editions held in even-numbered years, the tournament will act as the UEFA qualifiers for the FIFA U-20 World Cup. The top four teams of the tournament will qualify for the 2027 FIFA U-20 World Cup in Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan as the UEFA representatives besides Azerbaijan who automatically qualified as co-host, with the fifth-placed team advancing to the intercontinental play-off series.
Venues
Upon being awarded the tournament in 2023, the Football Association of Wales anticipated that the tournament would be hosted in 5 venues (Bangor, Colwyn Bay, Deeside, Denbigh and Wrexham), with a later release no longer stating Deeside or Colwyn Bay as a venue, and replacing it with Caernarfon. Colwyn Bay was named as a training ground for the tournament.[3]. In November 2025, a test event was organised, which involved matches in Denbigh, Wrexham, and Rhyl, the latter not among the initial five named locations but will act as a training venue.[4]
| Wrexham | Bangor | |
|---|---|---|
| Racecourse Ground | Nantporth | |
| Capacity: 13,341 | Capacity: 3,000 | |
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| Caernarfon | Denbigh | |
| The Oval Capacity: 3,000 |
Central Park Capacity: 2,300 | |
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 | |
Qualification
Qualified teams
The following teams qualified for the final tournament.
Note: All appearance statistics include only U-19 era (since 2002).
| Team | Qualification method | Date of qualification | Appearance(s) | Previous best performance[a] | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total | First | Last | Streak | ||||
 Wales |
Host nation | 26 September 2023 | 1st | Debut | |||
 Germany |
Elite round Group 1 winners | 31 March 2026 | 11th | 2017 | 2025 | 2 | Champions (2008, 2014) |
 Serbia |
Elite round Group 2 winners | 31 March 2026 | 9th | 2005 | 2022 | 1 | Champions (2013) |
 Croatia |
Elite round Group 3 winners | 31 March 2026 | 4th | 2010 | 2016 | 1 | Semi-finals (2010) |
 Denmark |
Elite round Group 4 winners | 31 March 2026 | 3rd | 2024 | 2025 | 3 | Group stage (2024, 2025) |
 Ukraine |
Elite round Group 5 winners | 28 March 2026 | 7th | 2004 | 2024 | 1 | Champions (2009) |
 Italy |
Elite round Group 6 winners | 31 March 2026 | 11th | 2003 | 2024 | 1 | Champions (2003, 2023) |
 Spain |
Elite round Group 7 winners | 31 March 2026 | 16th | 2002 | 2025 | 4 | Champions (2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2019, 2024) |
Group stage
The group winners and runners-up advanced to the semi-finals.
| Tie-breaking criteria for group play |
|---|
The ranking of teams in the group stage is determined as follows:
|
Group A
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wales (H) |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Knockout stage |
| 2 | Denmark |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| 3 | Germany |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off |
| 4 | Spain |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers
(H) Hosts
Group B
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Croatia |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Knockout stage |
| 2 | Serbia |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| 3 | Italy |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off |
| 4 | Ukraine |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers
Knockout stage
In the knockout stage, extra time and penalty shoot-out were used to decide the winners if necessary.
Bracket
Qualified teams for FIFA U-20 World Cup
The following five teams from UEFA qualified for the 2027 FIFA U-20 World Cup including Azerbaijan which qualified as co-host. while one team advanced to the inter-confederation play-offs.
| Team | Qualified on | Previous appearances in FIFA U-20 World Cup1 |
|---|---|---|
 Azerbaijan (H) | 2 October 2025 | 0 (debut) |
| July 2026 | ||
| July 2026 | ||
| July 2026 | ||
| July 2026 |
- 1 Bold indicates champions for that year. Italic indicates hosts for that year.
Notes
- Bold text indicates they hosted that edition.