2025-26 UEFA Champions League Knockout Phase: Key Details and Format

omidbasir- The league phase of the 2025-26 UEFA Champions League has now concluded, culminating in an exhilarating final matchweek that has revealed the 24 teams advancing in Europe’s premier club competition.

This brings us to the forthcoming draw for the knockout playoff round, scheduled for Friday, January 30, at 6 a.m. ET (11 a.m. GMT) at the House of European Football in Nyon, Switzerland.

A total of sixteen teams will participate in this draw. The teams that finished ninth through sixteenth in the league phase are seeded, while those that ended in seventeenth through twenty-fourth are unseeded.

The eight top teams from the league phase automatically progress to the round of 16, while teams finishing from twenty-fifth to thirty-sixth have been eliminated from the tournament.

The seeding system introduced for the 2024-25 season ensures that higher-placed teams from the league phase do not face each other in the knockout playoff round, promoting a more balanced competition structure.

The draw will pair teams based on their final league positions. For instance, ninth-place Real Madrid will be matched with tenth-place Internazionale, and eleventh-place Paris Saint-Germain will face twelfth-place Newcastle United, creating eight sets of paired teams.

During the draw, each pairing will be separated and placed on opposite sides of the bracket. The unseeded teams will be drawn first, with the first team going into the first half of the bracket and their paired opponent into the second half. The process will then continue with the seeded teams, establishing two fixtures between seeded and unseeded teams, with seeded clubs hosting the second leg.

Last season illustrated the significant impact of this new system. Manchester City, needing a win on the final day of the league phase to qualify for the knockout stage, finished in twenty-second place and faced seeded Real Madrid in the playoffs, resulting in a 6-3 aggregate loss. Conversely, PSG, despite being unseeded, navigated the playoff round successfully and went on to win the title.

This season, PSG, along with Inter Milan and Real Madrid, finds themselves outside the top eight, following unexpected results, such as Real Madrid’s surprising 4-2 defeat to Benfica in the last matchweek.

It is important to note that clubs from the same country are not permitted to face each other from the knockout playoff round onwards, though they may compete against teams they encountered during the league phase.

The teams drawn on Friday will compete in a two-legged knockout playoff round in February, with the draw for the round of 16 scheduled for February 27. This draw will determine the matchups for the round of 16 and finalize the bracket for the subsequent knockout stages.

Key Dates:
– Knockout playoff round: February 17-18, February 24-25
– Round of 16/quarterfinal/semifinal draw: February 27
– Round of 16: March 10-11, March 17-18
– Quarterfinals: April 7-8, April 14-15
– Semifinals: April 28-29, May 5-6
– Final: May 30 (Budapest)