Based on the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking the seeded teams will be Brazil, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Argentina and England along with host South Africa.
Oceania representative New Zealand has been included in Pot 2 alongside Australia, Japan, Korea DPR and Korea Republic from the Asian group as well as Honduras, Mexico and USA from the North, Central America and the Caribbean region.
Pot 3 will be comprised of teams from Africa (Algeria, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Nigeria) and South America (Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay). Finally, Pot 4 will have the remaining European teams (Denmark, France, Greece, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Switzerland).
In terms of how the draw is conducted, hosts South Africa will be automatically positioned as A1 while the other seeded teams will be drawn into groups B through to H, but will always be in position “1” of their group.
Groups will then be drawn from A to H and the positions in the group will be drawn for Pots 2 to 4. Geographical criteria will also be respected, meaning that no two teams from the same confederation will be drawn in the same group (except European teams, where a maximum of two will be in a group). For example, South Africa cannot play the African teams from Pot 3 and Argentina and Brazil cannot be drawn against the three remaining South American teams.