Qualification for the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations began on 23 March 2026. A total of 28 teams will qualify to play in the final tournament, including automatically qualified hosts Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
All CAF member associations are eligible to enter the competition. The seeding was based on the FIFA World Ranking from 19 November 2025.
The qualifiers group stage draw, originally scheduled for 19 December 2025, was postponed to 13 January 2026.
Teams ranked 1st to 42nd received a bye to the qualifying group stage, while the teams ranked 43rd to 54th have to participate in the preliminary round.
The schedule of the qualifying tournament is as follows.
The twelve teams were split into six ties which were played in home-and-away two-legged format. <section begin=Preliminary round /> <section end=Preliminary round />
48 teams will participate in this round.