This article describes the qualification for the 2026 Women's European Volleyball Championship.[1]
Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Sweden and Turkey as host countries were directly qualified. The eight best placed teams at the 2023 edition also gained direct entries into the tournament. 21 teams compete for the remaining 12 places at the final tournament.
| Means of qualification | Qualifier | Means of qualification | Qualifier | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Host Countries | Qualification | Pool A | |||
| Pool B | |||||
| Pool C | |||||
| Pool D | |||||
| 2023 European Championship | Pool E | ||||
| Pool F | |||||
| Pool G | |||||
| Best runners-up | |||||
| Total 24 | |||||
All of the hosted countries' teams directly qualified for the tournament. Then, the top eight teams from previous edition also automatically qualified.
| width=10px bgcolor=#ccffcc | Qualified for the 2026 European Championship | ||
| width=10px bgcolor=#87ceeb | Qualified as hosts for the 2026 European Championship |
| width=40 | Rank | width=180 | Team |
|---|---|---|---|
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| 24 |
There being seven pools of either three teams each, the winners of each pool and the 5 best runners-up qualified for the 2026 European Championship. The pools were played in a double round-robin.
| Original schedule | |
|---|---|
| Round | Round date |
| Matchday 1 | 17/18 August 2024 |
| Matchday 2 | 24/25 August 2024 |
| Matchday 3 | 31 August–1 September 2024 |
| Matchday 4 | 19/20 July 2025 |
| Matchday 5 | 26/27 July 2025 |
| Matchday 6 | 2/3 August 2025 |
| Round | Round date[2] |
|---|---|
| Matchday 1 | 17/18 August 2024 |
| Matchday 2 | 24/25 August 2024 |
| Matchday 3 | 28/29 August 2024 |
| Matchday 4 | 2/3 August 2025 |
| Matchday 5 | 6 August 2025 |
| Matchday 6 | 9/10 August 2025 |
The pools were set following the Serpentine system according to their European Ranking for national teams as of 6 November 2023. Rankings are shown in brackets.[1]
| width=180 | Pool A | width=165 | Pool B | width=210 | Pool C | width=175 | Pool D | width=165 | Pool E | width=165 | Pool F | width=320 | Pool G |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (6) | (10) | (13) | (16) | (17) | (18) | ||||||||
| (26) | (25) | (24) | (23) | (22) | (21) | (19) | |||||||
| (27) | (28) | (29) | (31) | (32) | (33) | (NR) | |||||||
Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 match points for the winner, 0 match points for the loser
Match won 3–2: 2 match points for the winner, 1 match point for the loser
After withdrawing from the Silver League in the 2024 Women's European Volleyball League,[3] [4] the president of the Armed Forces of Bosnia and Herzegovina controversially withdrew the team from the European Championship qualification despite the women's team being named the best Bosnian national team in 2023 and qualifying for two successive European Championships.[5]
When the federation announced this decision, the Armed Forces president, Milutin Popović, criticised members of the Armed Forces for internal disagreements in the association and also stated the some board members did not respond to him regarding the organisation of a meeting to do with the participation of the Bosnian national teams in 2024. Thus, they only managed to organise a meeting on 7 August, two weeks from Bosnia's first game against Montenegro.[6] Due to the lack of meetings, the federation also failed to get a coach for the qualifiers. Plus, he also alleged that they didn't receive funding from the government via the national lottery.
Following that statement, the Armed Forces vice president, Alija Fatić, responded to Popović by saying that it was not their decision to withdraw, rather it was Popović's choice to not to play the qualifiers and is quoted saying ""The real truth is that Popovic is incompetent, he didn't do anything".[7] Fatić also states that, unlike what Popović says, they have had several meetings but conversations about the national team was never on the agenda. The volleyball federation had also reportedly offered to fund the preparations and qualification matches, with the Bosnian Olympic Committee also offering to provide equipment, but Popović rejected this proposal.[7] [5]
President of the volleyball federation, Miloš Jelčić, further reiterated Fatić's claim while also mentioning that other athletes like swimmer Lana Pudar and her coaches have the same issues with Popović too.[8]
On 28 August 2024, the Bosnian volleyball federation denied media reports regarding their finances.[9]
In Popović's statement, he reportedly asked the CEV, if they receive the approval from group opponents Montenegro and Latvia, they would like to postpone their qualifiers for 2025.[6] However, this seems unlikely.
It is likely that the Bosnian volleyball federation will fined 50,000 Euros and suspended from national team competitions for two years due to their no-show in the qualifiers.[5]