Championnat National 1

The league was created in 1993 under the name Championnat National 2, as an heir to the now-defunct Division 3. The league's debut coincided with the creation of the Championnat National, the third division of French football, commonly known as National. For the first three years of the competition, an amateur champion was crowned in France regardless of whether the club was amateur or a reserve team. In 1998, the French Football Federation changed the competition's format creating two separate tables; one for the amateur clubs and another for the reserve teams of professional clubs. The dual tables allowed the league to declare a champion for the amateurs and the reserves, with four team tournaments being held following the conclusion of league play to determine the champions. At the same time, the competition was renamed Championnat de France Amateur (CFA). In 2001, the federation ended this style and reverted to the original format allowing both the amateur clubs and reserve teams to be grouped together based on their regional location. The winner of each group would then earn promotion to the Championnat National, unless the club is a reserve team. Meanwhile, the reserve teams continued to use the previous format with the best reserve teams of each group being inserted into a tournament to decide the reserves' champion.

In 2017, the FFF reorganised amateur football along the lines of the 2016 reorganisation of the Regions of France, creating thee Championnat National 2 and Championnat National 3 to replace CFA and CFA2. For National 2, this was in effect just a change of name, whilst National 3 saw a major restructure.^[1]

As part of the restructure of the French football leagues system between 2022 and 2026, the league was reduced from 64 teams across 4 groups in 2022–23, to 56 across 4 groups in 2023–24, and will have 48 teams across 3 groups from 2024 to 2025.^[2]

Ahead of the 2026–27 season, National 2 was renamed to Championnat National 1.^[3]

For the 2024–25 season, forty-eight clubs participated. The clubs were split into three parallel groups of 16 with their group affiliation being loosely based on the regional location. The league is open to the best reserve teams in France and amateur clubs in France, although only the amateur clubs are eligible for promotion to Ligue 3. During the course of a season, usually from August to May, each club plays the others in their respective group twice, once at their home stadium and once at that of their opponents, for a total of 30 games. Teams are ranked by total points, then head-to-head results and head-to-head goal difference. At the end of each season, the group champions are promoted to Championnat National and the best performing group champion is crowned overall champion of the season. For the 2024–25 season, the three lowest-ranked teams in each group were relegated to Championnat National 3, along with the worst performing thirteenth-placed team.

The following teams competed in the Championnat National 1 for the 2026–27 season.^[4]