UEFA Women's Champions League: Dates, teams, history & more

The UEFA Women's Champions League, the blue riband club event in European football, is about to start its 26th season.

Since the first running of the tournament, then called the UEFA Women's Cup, back in 2001/02, only eight different sides from five different countries have managed to put their names on the trophy.

French powers Lyon have won the tournament a record eight times while Barcelona are the defending champions having won the competition in the 2025/26 season.

UEFA Women's Champions League dates for 2026/27

League phase dates

• Matchday 1: 22/23 September
• Matchday 2: 30th September/1st October
• Matchday 3: 28/29 October
• Matchday 4: 10/11 November
• Matchday 5: 18/19 November
• Matchday 6: 16 December

Knockout calendar

• Knockout Phase Play-offsFirst leg: 3/4 FebruarySecond leg: 10/11 February

• Quarter-finals
  First leg: 23/24 March
  Second leg: 31 March/1 April

• Semi-finals
  First leg: 1/2 May
  Second leg: 8/9 May

• Final (Stadion Narodowy, Warsaw)
  28, 29 or 30 May 2027 (tbc)

UEFA Women's Champions League format

The format to the UEFA Women's Champions League has constantly been tweaked over the years as more sides have got involved.

The most recent iteration of the format follows that of the UEFA Champions League, with a league phase and knockout phase play-offs before continuing as normal with the quarter-finals.

UEFA Women's Champions League 2025/26 teams

A total of 68 teams will compete in the group stage qualifying rounds of the 2025/26 UEFA Women's Champions League, which included two rounds, with 46 teams in the Champions Path and 22 teams in the League Path. 

The six highest-ranked countries - France, Germany, Spain, England, Italy and Sweden - were able to enter three teams, another 10 countries including Scotland could enter two teams and the rest entered only one.

Confirmed teams for the 2026/27 UEFA Women's Champions League:

• Barcelona
• Lyon
• Bayern Munich
• Arsenal
• BK Hacken
• Roma
• Benfica
• Paris FC
• Manchester City

UEFA Women's Champions League history

The competition was first played in 2001/02 and was known as the UEFA Women's Cup.

Women's club football was only just beginning to stir at the start of the century with just 33 teams from 33 countries taking part.

There was no Barcelona, no Lyon, no Chelsea back in 2001/02 where the qualifiers for the quarter-finals included the likes of Russian outfit Ryazan, Trondheims-Orn from Norway and Finnish club HJK.

Frankfurt were the winners of the inaugural tournament, beating Swedish side Umea 2-0 in front of a crowd of 12,106 at the German club's home ground.

The first major change in the tournament, tapping into the growth of the women's game, came in 2009/10 when it was rebranded the UEFA Women's Champions League, which allowed the runners-up as well as winners of Europe's top leagues to enter and opened its doors to all 55 associations.

Six-time German champions Turbine Potsdam won the title that season, making them one of four German clubs to be crowned queens of Europe. No other country has produced more winning teams.

Lyon won the first of their record eight titles in 2010/11 and for a period were simply invincible, the likes of record scorer Ada Hegerberg leading them to five titles in a row from 2015/16.

From 2021 the competition was given another tweak, this time allowing the top six-ranked countries to enter three teams, up from two.

Barcelona produced a dominant performance in last year's final, dispatching Lyon 4-0.

2026/27 UEFA Women's Champions League draw

The 26/27 league phase draw will be done on September 4th f2026, once the qualifying rounds are completed and the full list of teams confirmed.