The Champions League is one of the most prestigious competitions in club soccer. It’s the only tournament that can award its champion a trophy (the actual cup is not allowed to leave the club, so they get a replica). But winning it takes more than just talent: it requires heart and luck too. Only a handful of clubs have ever won the Champions League, with Real Madrid leading all time with fifteen championships. They’re joined by AC Milan, Liverpool, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Ajax and Manchester United.
The modern era of the Champions League began in 1992-1993, with a new format modeled after the FIFA World Cup. The initial edition included eight teams in a group stage, with a final between the two top team from each group. Since then the tournament has been expanded on several occasions, and is now 32 teams total, with the qualifiers excluded.
As of 2024-25, the tournament has a so-called “league phase,” with thirty-two qualified teams ranked as a single group and competing in a round-robin schedule. The groups are balanced through a coefficient-based seeding system, and the top two teams from each group advance to the knockout round.
In the past, the top clubs from European football’s top-tier domestic leagues automatically qualified for the Champions League through their standard berth allocation. However, starting in 2021-22, the competition underwent a significant change to its qualifying structure: second- through fourth-place teams from lower-ranked leagues competed in a separate playoff series to earn spots in the Champions League.