99 days to the World Cup: How much does the winning team get paid?
99 days to the World Cup: How much does the winning team get paid?
Yahoo Sports StaffWed, March 4, 2026 at 10:00 AM UTC
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There are 99 days left until the 2026 World Cup kicks off in North America. (Henry Russell/Yahoo Sports) (Henry Russell/Yahoo Sports)
The countdown to the 2026 World Cup is on! Each day ahead of the tournament’s return to North America, Yahoo Sports will highlight an insight or moment that showcases just how grand the world’s biggest sporting spectable has become — even beyond the expanded field of this year’s global event.
The winner of the 2026 World Cup is going home with far more than a trophy and the adulation of their respective nation. It will also receive a record $50 million in prize money.
The 2026 tournament will see a $727 million total fund with $655 million of that amount to be shared among the 48 qualified nations, the largest field in World Cup history. Teams that are eliminated in the group stage will leave with $9 million, while the runners-up in the final will take home $33 million.
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World Cup 2026 prize pool
Champions: $50 million
Runners-up: $33 million
3rd place: $29 million
4th place: $27 million
5th-8th place: $19 million
9th-16th place: $15 million
17th- 32nd place: $11 million
33rd-48th place: $9 million
In 2022, World Cup winners Argentina received $42 million after defeating France in the final. Four years earlier, France earned $38 million after beating Croatia for the trophy at the 2018 World Cup in Russia.
Since FIFA began making the amount of prize money handed out public, the total amount given to the winners has grown from $2.2 million to Italy at the 1982 World Cup to the $50 million to whoever lifts the trophy at MetLife Stadium on July 19.
The value of a lifetime of memories from winning the World Cup, however, remains the same: priceless.
Source: “AOL Sports”
