| Upcoming Season: | 2025 FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship |
| Sport: | Volleyball |
| Inaugural: | 1949 |
| Ceo: | Ary Graça |
| Teams: | 24 (finals) |
| Continent: | World (FIVB) |
| Champion: | (4th title) |
| Most Champs: | (6 titles) |
| Streaming: | Volleyball TV (since 2018) |
| Website: | Volleyball World Championship |
The FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship is an international volleyball competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of French: [[Fédération Internationale de Volleyball]] (FIVB), the sport's global governing body. The initial gap between championships was variable, but since 1962, they were held every four years. The tournament will be held biennially starting in 2025.[1]
The current champion is Italy, who won their fourth title at the 2022 tournament, defeating Poland in the final.
The current format of the competition involves a qualification phase, which currently takes place over the preceding three years, to determine which teams qualify for the tournament phase, which is often called the World Championship Finals. The former format was 24 teams, including the automatically qualifying host nation(s), compete in the tournament phase for the title at venues within the host nation(s) over a period of about a month.
The 20 World Championship tournaments have been won by seven different national teams: the Soviet Union six times; Italy four times; Brazil and Poland three times each; Czechoslovakia twice; and East Germany and the United States, once each.
The history of the World Championship goes back to the beginnings of volleyball as a professional, high level sport. One of the first concrete measures taken by the FIVB after its foundation in 1947 was the establishment of an international competition involving teams from more than one continent. In 1949, the first edition was played in Prague, Czechoslovakia. At that point, the tournament was still restricted to Europe.
Three years later, the event was expanded to include nations from Asia, and began to be held in 4-year cycles. By the following edition, there were also teams from South, Central and North America.
Since volleyball was to be added to the Olympic Program in 1964, the 4-cycles were advanced in 2 years after the fourth edition (1960), so that the World Championship may alternate with the Summer Olympic Games. As of 1970, teams from Africa also took part in the competition, and the original goal of having members from all five continental confederations in the games was achieved.
The number of teams involved in the games has changed significantly over the years. Following volleyball's increase in popularity, they raised steadily to over 20 in the 1970s and part of the 1980s, were then cut short to 16 in the 1990s, and finally set up in 24 after 2002. Today, the World Championship is the most comprehensive of all events organized by the FIVB, and arguably the most important, alongside the Olympic Games.[2]
Until 1974, the host nation of the tournament organized both the men's and the women's events, with the single exception of the 1966/1967 games, which took place in different years. Since 1978, this practice has been only occasionally observed, for instance, in 1998 and in the 2006 edition, which was held, as the former was, in Japan.
On 15 October 2022, FIVB announced the expansion of World Championships and the changes to the competition formula. A total of 32 teams are to compete for future editions of the tournament.[3]
On 22 June, 2023, Volleyball Calendar 2025–2028 approved by FIVB shown that World Championships to be played biannually in odd years. The first reformed World Championships will be held in 2025 with 32 teams in new formula.
The history of the World Championship clearly demonstrates how volleyball was originally dominated by European nations.
The first two editions were won by the Soviet Union. In 1956, twice runner-up Czechoslovakia took the gold. There followed two more consecutive wins for the Soviet Union, in both cases over Czechoslovakia. The Czechs won a gold medal in the 1966 edition.
In 1970, East Germany prevailed over Bulgaria for their first and only title. In 1974, the Soviet Union threatened to take the lead once more, but ended up being defeated by Poland at the final. Nevertheless, they would confirm their leadership by winning, for the third time, two editions in a row.
1986 saw the first relevant confrontation between United States, the rising major force of the decade, and the traditional leader Soviet Union after the Olympic boycotts of 1980 and 1984. As would be the case two years later at the Seoul Olympic Games, the issue was settled in favour of the Americans led by Karch Kiraly and Steve Timmons. Italy completely dominated the competition in the 1990s, winning all the editions that took place in this decade (1990, 1994, 1998), led by such players as Lorenzo Bernardi and Andrea Giani.
In the 2000s, Brazil became the leading force in the sport, also winning three consecutive editions (2002, 2006 and 2010), the first of which in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the same stage where the Brazilians had been runners-up in 1982. In 2014, hosts Poland defeated Brazil in four sets at the final, achieving their second gold medal and preventing what would have been a historic fourth title in a row. In 2018, Poland won a second consecutive title, again defeating Brazil in the final. In 2022, Poland, playing at home, missed the opportunity to win three consecutive editions by losing in the final to Italy, who won their fourth World title.
As of 2022, 20 editions of the men's Volleyball World Championship have been played: 16 went to European teams, and four to American teams (three times to Brazil and once to the United States).
See main article: List of FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship qualifications.
| Confederation | Slots | |
|---|---|---|
| CAVB (Africa) | 2 | |
| AVC (Asia and Oceania) | 4 | |
| CEV (Europe) | 8 | |
| NORCECA (North America) | 6 | |
| CSV (South America) | 2 | |
| Total | 24 (22+H+C) |
| Confederation | Slots | |
|---|---|---|
| CAVB (Africa) | 2 | |
| AVC (Asia and Oceania) | 2 | |
| CEV (Europe) | 2 | |
| NORCECA (North America) | 2 | |
| CSV (South America) | 2 | |
| World ranked non-qualified teams | 12 | |
| Total | 24 (22+H+C) |
The competition formula of the FIVB World Championship has been constantly changed to fit the different number of teams that participate in each edition. The following rules usually apply:
A totally brand new competition formula was announced by FIVB. A total of 32 teams will compete in the World Championship. The teams will be divided into 8 groups of 4 teams for the round-robin phase with 2 best teams per group moving into the direct knockout phase: round of 16, quarterfinals, semi-finals and final.
See also: National team appearances in the FIVB Men's Volleyball World Championship.
| Year | Host | width=1% rowspan=25 bgcolor=#ffffff | Final | width=1% rowspan=25 bgcolor=#ffffff | 3rd place match | width=1% rowspan=25 bgcolor=#ffffff | Teams | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| width=14% | Champions | width=9% | Score | width=14% | Runners-up | width=14% | 3rd place | width=9% | Score | width=14% | 4th place | |||||||
| 1949 Details | Czechoslovakia | Round-robin (3–1) | Round-robin (3–1) | 10 | ||||||||||||||
| 1952 Details | Soviet Union | Round-robin (3–0) | Round-robin (3–1) | 11 | ||||||||||||||
| 1956 Details |  France | Round-robin (3–2) | Round-robin (3–1) | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 1960 Details |  Brazil | Round-robin (3–0) | Round-robin (3–1) | 14 | ||||||||||||||
| 1962 Details | Soviet Union | Round-robin (3–0) | Round-robin (2–3) | 21 | ||||||||||||||
| 1966 Details | Czechoslovakia | Round-robin (3–1) | Round-robin (3–0) | 22 | ||||||||||||||
| 1970 Details | Bulgaria | Round-robin (3–2) | Round-robin (3–0) | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 1974 Details |  Mexico | Round-robin (3–2) | Round-robin (3–1) | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 1978 Details |  Italy | 3–0 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 1982 Details |  Argentina | 3–0 | 3–0 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 1986 Details | France | 3–1 | 3–0 | 16 | ||||||||||||||
| 1990 Details | Brazil | 3–1 | 3–0 | 16 | ||||||||||||||
| 1994 Details | Greece | 3–1 | 3–1 | 16 | ||||||||||||||
| 1998 Details |  Japan | 3–0 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2002 Details | Argentina | 3–2 | 3–0 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2006 Details | Japan | 3–0 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2010 Details | Italy | 3–0 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2014 Details |  Poland | 3–1 | 3–0 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2018 Details | Italy / Bulgaria | 3–0 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2022 Details | Poland / Slovenia | 3–1 | 3–1 | 24 | ||||||||||||||
| 2025 Details | Philippines | – | – | 32 | -bgcolor=#e8e8f0 | 2027 Details | – | – | 32 | |||||||||
| 2029 Details | – | – | 32 --> | |||||||||||||||
List of hosts by number of championships hosted.
| Times hosted | Nations | Year(s) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | 1978, 2010, 2018 | ||
| align=center rowspan=8 | 2 | 1982, 2002 | |
| 1960, 1990 | |||
| 1970, 2018 | |||
| 1949, 1966 | |||
| 1956, 1986 | |||
| 1998, 2006 | |||
| 2014, 2022 | |||
| 1952, 1962 | |||
| align=center rowspan=3 | 1 | 1994 | |
| 1974 | |||
| 2022 |
* = co-hosts.
Boldface denotes active volleyball players and highest medal count among all players (including these who not included in these tables) per type.
| Rank | Player | Country | From | To | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1990 | 1998 | 3 | – | – | 3 | ||
| 2002 | 2010 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 1990 | 1998 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 1990 | 1998 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 1990 | 1998 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 2002 | 2010 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 2002 | 2010 | 3 | – | – | 3 | |||
| 8 | 1952 | 1966 | 2 | 3 | – | 5 | ||
| 9 | 1956 | 1966 | 2 | 2 | – | 4 | ||
| 1974 | 1986 | 2 | 2 | – | 4 |
The table shows players who have won at least 4 medals in total at the World Championships.
| Rank | Player | Country | From | To | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1952 | 1966 | 2 | 3 | – | 5 | ||
| 2 | 1956 | 1966 | 2 | 2 | – | 4 | ||
| 1974 | 1986 | 2 | 2 | – | 4 | |||
| 4 | 1949 | 1960 | 1 | 3 | – | 4 | ||
| 5 | Bruno Rezende | 2010 | 2022 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | |
| Lucas Saatkamp | 2010 | 2022 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | ||
| 7 | 1956 | 1966 | – | 2 | 2 | 4 | ||
| 1956 | 1966 | – | 2 | 2 | 4 | |||
| 1956 | 1966 | – | 2 | 2 | 4 |
See main article: world championships.