The wait is almost over. On Thursday 27th August, the 36 clubs who’ve fought their way into the Champions League league phase will finally discover who stands between them and glory. Eight opponents each. Eight nights of European football to dream about. This is the moment the new season truly kicks into gear.
Paris Saint-Germain arrive as back-to-back champions, having seen off Arsenal in Budapest back in May to defend the crown they’d waited a lifetime for. Now every rival in the draw gets a shot at knocking them off the top.
Since the format shake-up in 2024/25, this draw carries more weight than ever. Gone are the simple groups of four. In their place: a sprawling 36-team league phase where every club gets a completely unique run of fixtures. Here’s the full breakdown.
When and what time is the draw?
Mark it down: the league phase draw goes live on Thursday 27th August, starting at 5pm BST.
The 36 teams and their pots
Every club has been slotted into one of four pots based on European ranking. Here’s who’s in the mix.
Pot 1
- Paris Saint-Germain (France)
- Bayern Munich (Germany)
- Real Madrid (Spain)
- Liverpool (England)
- Inter Milan (Italy)
- Manchester City (England)
- Arsenal (England)
- Barcelona (Spain)
- Atletico Madrid (Spain)
Pot 2
- Borussia Dortmund (Germany)
- Roma (Italy)
- Sporting (Portugal)
- Aston Villa (England)
- Porto (Portugal)
- Manchester United (England)
- Club Brugge (Belgium)
- Real Betis (Spain)
- PSV Eindhoven (Netherlands)
Pot 3
- Feyenoord (Netherlands)
- Lille (France)
- Bodo/Glimt (Norway)
- Napoli (Italy)
- RB Leipzig (Germany)
- Villarreal (Spain)
- Shakhtar Donetsk (Ukraine)
- Galatasaray (Turkey)
- Winner of Fenerbahce (Turkey) vs Lyon (France)
Pot 4
- Winner of Dinamo Zagreb (Croatia) vs Viking (Norway)
- Winner of Slovan Bratislava (Slovakia) vs Celje (Slovenia)
- Slavia Prague (Czech Republic)
- VfB Stuttgart (Germany)
- LASK (Austria)
- Winner of Levski Sofia (Bulgaria) vs AEK Athens (Greece)
- Como (Italy)
- Lens (France)
- Sabah (Azerbaijan)
So how does this draw actually work?
Forget everything you knew about the old group stage. Since 2024/25, the Champions League runs on a Swiss-style league phase, and it changes everything about how the draw plays out.
Instead of four teams locked into a group together, each club now gets eight completely different opponents, drawn two at a time from each of the four pots. That means every single team walks away with a unique, one-of-a-kind fixture list. No two clubs face the exact same run of games.
The process itself is simple to follow. Balls come out of Pot 1 first, with two matches assigned per team, and the draw works its way down through Pot 2, Pot 3 and Pot 4 until every club has its full set of eight opponents locked in. There’s just one built-in rule to keep things fair: no team can be drawn against a side from its own country.
Eight matchdays. Thirty-six unique paths through the group stage. Thursday decides who’s walking into a nightmare draw and who’s catching a break.