World Cup 2026 Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri (Photo by Jay Biggerstaff/Getty Images)
The 2026 World Cup is fast approaching, and Thursday night’s match between Mexico and South Africa will kick off the highly anticipated tournament.
The coming days will also see matches from powerhouse teams such as Brazil, Germany, Netherlands, Spain and England, in what promises to be a very exciting contest between so many world-class players.
FIFA increases World Cup prize money by 50%
Late last year, it was reported that FIFA would increase the prize money for World Cup winners by 50% for the 2026 tournament.
FIFA has received some criticism for some of its handling of this year’s World Cup, but this looks like a fairly generous amount of funding that could help many countries. In a way, it’s similar to how some online gaming and casino sites offer free sweep coins with no deposit required, allowing you to earn money without making a deposit yourself.
Some countries, such as Curaçao and Cape Verde, will be participating in this stage for the first time, so being able to win this prize just by participating is a huge boost, which can then be invested in improving football training and grassroots development for the future.
For a complete breakdown of how much money the World Cup winners and other competing teams will earn, see below…
- Champion: $50 million
- Runner-up: $33 million
- 3rd place: $29 million
- 4th place: $27 million
- 5th-8th place: $19 million
- 9th to 16th: $15 million
- 17th to 32nd: $11 million
- 33rd-48th: $9 million
- All eligible teams: $1.5 million in preparation fees.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino said that with this increase in prize money, “Be groundbreaking in terms of economic contribution to the global football community.”
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Who will win the 2026 World Cup?
This year’s World Cup has expanded to 48 teams, so we’ll have to wait a little longer to find out who will win, but we already know there’s a huge prize at stake this year.
There is therefore a lot at stake for the winner of this year’s tournament, with France and Spain likely to be seen as early favorites.
Beyond these two teams, the usual contenders such as England, Brazil, Argentina and Germany will surely be there or there, but could fatigue play a role this year?
The football calendar has been extremely busy since the addition of the expanded Club World Cup last summer, with many players likely to have played almost non-stop for two years.
It has only been a short break since the end of the club season, so some traditionally ‘big’ national teams may find it difficult to achieve their usual results if their players have not fully recovered.
