Champions League 2025/26: When will the round of 16 draw take place?

The road to European club football’s ultimate prize narrows on Friday, 27 February 2026, when the UEFA Champions League round of 16 draw is staged at the governing body’s lakeside headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. The ceremony, scheduled to begin at 11:00 am GMT, will set the pairings for the first knockout phase under the competition’s revamped format and bring the continent’s heavyweight clubs one step closer to the final at London’s Wembley Stadium.

With the qualifying play-offs now concluded, the list of participants is effectively complete. Eight sides earned automatic passage by finishing inside the top eight of the league phase: Arsenal, Bayern Munich, Liverpool FC, Tottenham Hotspur, FC Barcelona, Chelsea FC, Sporting CP and Manchester City. They will be joined by five teams that navigated the two-legged knockout route: Atlético de Madrid, Newcastle United, Bodø/Glimt, Bayer Leverkusen and Atalanta. The identities of the final qualifiers will be confirmed once the remaining play-off ties are settled.

UEFA’s draw procedure will pair the 16 remaining clubs for ties to be played in March 2026, keeping apart clubs from the same association and seeding the group-stage winners to face the play-off victors. The draw marks the moment the tournament shifts from the relative safety of the league phase to the do-or-drama of two-legged knockout football, where away goals are no longer a tie-breaker and every minute carries the weight of continental ambition.