World Cup Early Ticket Draw
The Main Early Ticket Draw Applications opened today. The application window will close at 11:00 ET Friday, October 31st. Then if it’s like the previous draw, here’s what to expect:
People will be notified if their application is successful starting on November 7th.
You usually get a 48 hour notice before your “turn” to hop into the website and purchase, and that purchase window is 48 hours long.
There will be rolling acceptances every two days. So expect emails to be sent on 11/7, 11/9, 11/11, 11/13, etc.
In the last draw, I don’t know anyone personally who was selected in the first two rolling acceptance windows, the first people were 5 days later. With more the following week.
You receive no notice if you aren’t selected until the end of that window, which will be likely the week of 11/24.
There is no rush to do anything right now, just apply before that Friday deadline. It will only take a few minutes, here is the link to the official website. Make sure to click on the left box under Tickets “Learn More”, not Hospitality “Browse+Buy Packages” or Marketplace “Resell/Exchange Now”
Select the Learn More button on the left
If you already applied in the previous draw then all you need to do is update your credit card and hit apply. You can review your profile and preferences and make sure it still matches.
If it’s your first time, you need to:
Make a FIFA account
Add your Personal Information
Add a valid Visa credit card or debit card
Select your preferences:
Which country you support
Which rounds you’re interested in
Which cities / locations you’re interested in
That is all. Here are the profile and confirmations.
Pulled from the previous post, here are my profile selections:
I selected all rounds of the tournament, most of the cities (except the ones in Texas, Florida, and Mexico), and the Netherlands as the country I support. Sorry, my American patriotism is at an all-time low, and going to the Netherlands twice in the last two years, and attending 3 Dutch national team matches in the last three years have me feeling quite Oranje.
If you’re looking for a better idea of what to set your preferences for, especially given that the World Cup draw hasn’t happened and the majority of the teams haven’t even officially qualified yet, you can read my last post breaking down (pretty blindly, but with historical comparative data) which matches you should get. I would suggest obviously for your own geography, but try and focus on the later knockout rounds and group stage matches on weekends or holidays as those are going to be the most solid indicators of demand, and least risk for an early purchase (given the likely economic issues over the next year).
It is unclear what you will be selected for to be able to purchase… but we shall see. Last time at this stage. You could apply for specific ticket package, and then you were notified if you were eligible to purchase them and you had a reserved spot to do so. For example, in the last World Cup’s application, I selected a Team Specific Ticket series 7 (they came in 3, 4, or 7), and I picked which category (pricing / seating area) I would be interested in paying for. I applied on 1/20/22, and received notification on 3/8/22 that I would be able to purchase the package. Then I received an email that I had been selected, and I had until 3/21/22 to complete payment.
The system this year seems to follow the more traditional American capitalism route / “Taylor Swift” model. Apply to be one of millions in a website-crashing surge of potential buyers racing at certain times of the day to try and be the quickest to snag tickets. Also, it should be noted that multiple accounts / applications will be flagged, so if you want to improve your odds, you’ll have to have other people you know apply. Hence this post! Hi family and friends whom I’ve coopted into applying for this!
We wait to hear back from FIFA about the application statuses, starting September 29th. Tickets will be available to purchase to those selected October 27 - October 31, so plenty of time to figure out if you’re in, for what, how much for, etc.
Good luck to us all.