FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) was founded in Paris at the headquarters of the Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques by the national associations of Belgium, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Spain (represented by Real Madrid CF), Sweden, and Switzerland. The German Football Association declared its intention to join the same day by telegram, setting the stage for a central body to oversee international football.
Frenchman Robert Guérin became FIFA’s first president, helping establish the organization’s early leadership and international ambitions.
Daniel Burley Woolfall of England replaced Guérin as president. Under his tenure, FIFA began to consolidate its role in international competition.
FIFA staged its first tournament: the association football competition at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London. The event’s success strengthened FIFA’s standing, even as participation by professional players clashed with some founding principles.
FIFA’s membership expanded beyond Europe as South Africa (1909), Argentina (1912), Canada and Chile (1913), and the United States (1914) applied to join. This marked FIFA’s shift from a European-led body toward a truly global organization.
During World War I, FIFA’s survival was in doubt due to travel limitations and players being sent to war. After Woolfall’s death, Dutch official Carl Hirschmann helped keep the organization operating, though the UK’s Home Nations withdrew over postwar tensions before later returning.
The first FIFA World Cup was held in Montevideo, Uruguay. This became FIFA’s flagship tournament and a defining pillar of its global influence in football.
FIFA launched the FIFA Women's World Cup, establishing a major global tournament for women’s international football and expanding FIFA’s top-tier competition portfolio.
FIFA adopted the FIFA Anthem (composed by Franz Lambert) beginning with the 1994 FIFA World Cup, contributing to a standardized global identity for FIFA events.
FIFA sanctioned the use of goal-line technology, following IFAB approval and amid renewed scrutiny after a high-profile refereeing incident at the 2010 FIFA World Cup. This marked a major shift toward technology-assisted officiating.
The 2015 FIFA corruption case erupted when the U.S. Department of Justice indicted 14 officials and executives over alleged bribery and corruption spanning decades. The scandal severely damaged FIFA’s reputation and triggered suspensions, bans, and demands for governance reform.
Gianni Infantino was elected FIFA president at an extraordinary FIFA Congress, after Sepp Blatter was suspended pending a corruption investigation. The election represented a leadership turning point in the wake of the 2015 crisis.
The International Football Association Board (IFAB) wrote video assistant referees (VAR) into the Laws of the Game permanently, after FIFA had long opposed video review. This formalized a new era of officiating support in top-level competitions.
FIFA launched FIFA+, an OTT streaming service intended to show large volumes of live matches and provide archival World Cup content. The platform reflected FIFA’s push into direct-to-consumer media distribution.
Previous logo (2022–2025)
After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, FIFA suspended Russia from competitions; the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld the ban after an appeal by the Russian Football Union. This was a notable example of FIFA using suspension as a major sanction in response to geopolitical events.