The FIFA Women's World Ranking is a ranking system for women's national teams in association football (commonly known as football or soccer) published by the international governing body FIFA. As of August 2025, the Spain national team is ranked number one.
The rankings were introduced in 2003, FIFA attempts to assess the strength of internationally active women's national teams at any given time based on their past game results with the most successful teams being ranked highest. , the ranking has 196 national teams. The ranking has more than informative value, as it is often used to seed member associations into different pots in international tournaments.
Specifics of the ranking system
- FIFA Women's World Rankings are based on every international match a team ever played, dating back to 1971, the first FIFA-recognized women's international between France and the Netherlands.
- FIFA Women's World Rankings are implicitly weighted to emphasize recent results.
- FIFA Women's World Rankings are only published four times a year. Normally, rankings are released in March, June, September and December. (In World Cup years, dates may be adjusted to reflect the World Cup results.)
The first two points result from the FIFA Women's World Rankings system being based on the Elo rating system adjusted for football; in 2018, FIFA modified the men's ranking system to similarly be based on Elo systems after continued criticism. FIFA considers the ratings for teams with fewer than 5 matches provisional and at the end of the list. In addition, any team that plays no matches for 4 years becomes unranked; this inactivity limit was previously 18 months, but was extended in early 2021 (after the COVID-19 pandemic stifled a significant amount of international play).
Ranking calculations
The rankings are based on the following formulae:
:<math>R_{aft} = R_{bef} + K (S_{act} - S_{exp})</math>
:<math>S_{exp} = \frac{1}{1 + 10^{-x/2</math>
<!-- This is not exactly stated in the reference, but that equation does not give sensible results, while this one matches the general Elo format -->
:<math>x = \frac{R_{bef} - O_{bef} \pm H}{c}</math>
Where
{| style="width:50%;"
|-
|width=4%|
|-
|<math>R_{aft}</math>||= The team rating after the match<br/>
|-
|<math>R_{bef}</math>||= The team rating before the match<br/>
|-
|<math>K</math>||= <math>15 M</math>, the weighted importance of the match<br/>
|-
|<math>S_{act}</math>||= The actual result of the match, see below<br/>
|-
|<math>S_{exp}</math>||= The expected result of the match<br/>
|-
|<math>x</math>||= The scaled difference in rating points between the teams<br/>
|-
|<math>O_{bef}</math>||= The opposing team's rating before the match<br/>
|-
|<math>H</math>||= The "home advantage" correction, see below<br/>
|-
|<math>c</math>||= A scaling factor, see below<br/>
|-
|<math>M</math>||= The "Match Importance Factor", see below<br/>
|}
The average points of all teams are about 1,300 points. The top nations usually exceed 2,000 points. In order to be ranked, a team must have played at least more than 5 matches against officially ranked teams, and have not been inactive for the last 48 months up to the date the rankings are published. Even if teams are not officially ranked, their points rating is kept constant until they play their next match.
Actual result of the match
The main component of the actual result is whether the team wins, loses, or draws, but goal difference is also taken into account. If the match results in a winner and loser, the loser is awarded a percentage given by the accompanying table, with the result always less than or equal to 20% (for goal differences greater than zero). The result is based on the goal difference and the number of goals they scored. The remaining percentage points are awarded to the winner. For example, a 2–1 match has the result awarded 84%–16% respectively, a 4–3 match has the result awarded 82%–18%, and an 5–3 match has the result awarded 96.2%–3.8%. As such, it is possible for a team to lose points even if they win a match, assuming they did not "win by enough". If the match ends in a draw the teams are awarded the same result, but the number depends on the goals scored so the results will not necessarily add up to 100%. For example, a 0–0 draw earns both teams 47% each, a 1–1 draw earns 50% each, and a 4–4 draw earns 52.5% each.
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
|- style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|
| colspan="7"|Goal Difference
|- style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"
| ||0||1||2||3||4||5||6 /+
|- style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"
| Goals scored<br/>by non winning team || colspan=7| Actual result (percentage)
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|0||47.0 / 47.0||85.0 / 15.0||92.0 / 8.0||96.0 / 4.0||97.0 / 3.0||98.0 / 2.0||99.0 / 1.0
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|1||50.0 / 50.0||84.0 / 16.0||91.1 / 8.9||95.2 / 4.8||96.3 / 3.7||97.4 / 2.6||98.5 / 1.5
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|2||51.0 / 51.0||83.0 / 17.0||90.2 / 9.8||94.4 / 5.6||95.6 / 4.4||96.8 / 3.2||98.0 / 2.0
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|3||52.0 / 52.0||82.0 / 18.0||89.3 / 10.7||93.6 / 6.4||94.9 / 5.1||96.2 / 3.8||97.5 / 2.5
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|4||52.5 / 52.5||81.0 / 19.0||88.4 / 11.6||92.8 / 7.2||94.2 / 5.8||95.6 / 4.4||97.0 / 3.0
|-
| style="text-align:center; background:#f0f0f0;"|5||53.0 / 53.0||80.0 / 20.0||87.5 / 12.5||92.0 / 8.0||93.5 / 6.5||95.0 / 5.0||96.5 / 3.5
|}
Source:
Leaders
As of the 7 August 2025 rankings release, Spain is the number one ranked team. The United States holds the record for the longest consecutive period leading the rankings of nearly 7 years, from March 2008 to December 2014. Before the 2023 World Cup, the United States and Germany had been the only two teams to lead the women's rankings, and these two teams also had held the top two spots in all but six releases, when Germany was ranked third (only Norway, Brazil, England, and Sweden had reached second during this time).
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!
! Team
! Confederation
! Days at No. 1
|-
|style="text-align:center"| 1 |||| CONCACAF ||6,070 days
|-
|style="text-align:center"| 2 |||| UEFA || 1,701 days
|-
|style="text-align:center"| 3 |||| UEFA || days
|-
|style="text-align:center"| 4 |||| UEFA || 112 days
|-
|}
See also
- Geography of women's association football
- FIFA International Match Calendar
- Statistical association football predictions
- UEFA coefficient
- World Football Elo Ratings
References
External links
- Women's World Ranking Procedure at FIFA.com
- Women’s World Ranking Fact Sheet