World Cup 2026 referees: FIFA confirms the full official match official lists
FIFA has now officially confirmed the full match-official roster for the 2026 World Cup. The governing body announced the appointments on 9 April, naming 52 referees, 88 assistant referees and 30 video match officials from all six confederations and 50 member associations for the tournament in the United States, Canada and Mexico. FIFA also described it as the most extensive World Cup officiating line-up in tournament history, which fits the scale of a 48-team event with 104 matches.
For The VAR Verdict, that is the real angle. This is not just a routine officials announcement. It is the referee team for the biggest men’s World Cup ever staged, and that means the standard will be judged over a much wider and more demanding body of work than in previous editions. Consistency, VAR intervention threshold, offside accuracy and game-control management will matter as much as the headline decisions in the latter rounds. That is an inference from the tournament’s size and FIFA’s own emphasis on preparation, monitoring and performance consistency.
FIFA said the selection process ran for more than three years and was based on its long-standing “quality first” principle. Pierluigi Collina said the chosen officials came through seminars, FIFA tournaments, and regular assessment in domestic and international football, with ongoing physical and mental preparation continuing into the pre-tournament period.
Why this matters
This official list gives us the first real picture of how FIFA wants the 2026 World Cup officiated. The names show a mix of established World Cup and UEFA/CONMEBOL tournament referees, high-level CONCACAF officials for a home-region World Cup, and a broad geographic spread across every confederation. In practical terms, that means the refereeing conversation around this tournament has already started well before the opening match.
Official referees list (52)
AFC: Omar Al Ali, Abdulrahman Al-Jassim, Khalid Al-Turais, Alireza Faghani, Ma Ning, Adham Makhadmeh, Ilgiz Tantashev, Yusuke Araki.
CAF: Omar Abdulkadir Artan, Pierre Atcho, Dahane Beida, Mustapha Ghorbal, Jalal Jayed, Amin Omar, Abongile Tom.
CONCACAF: Iván Barton, Juan Gabriel CalderĂłn, Ismail Elfath, Oshane Nation, Drew Fischer, Katia Itzel GarcĂa, SaĂd MartĂnez, Tori Penso, CĂ©sar Arturo Ramos.
CONMEBOL: Ramon Abatti, Juan Gabriel BenĂtez, Raphael Claus, Yael FalcĂłn, Cristián Garay, DarĂo Herrera, Kevin Ortega, AndrĂ©s Rojas, Wilton Sampaio, Gustavo Tejera, Facundo Tello, JesĂşs Valenzuela.
OFC: Campbell-Kirk Kawana-Waugh.
UEFA: Espen Eskås, Alejandro Hernández Hernández, István Kovács, François Letexier, Danny Makkelie, Szymon Marciniak, Maurizio Mariani, Glenn Nyberg, Michael Oliver, João Pinheiro, Sandro Schärer, Anthony Taylor, Clément Turpin, Slavko Vinčić, Felix Zwayer.
Official assistant referees list (88)
Amos Abeigne, Mahmoud Abouelregal, Mostafa Akarkad, Mohammed Al-Bakry, Mohamed Al-Hammadi, Mohammad Al-Kalaf, Saoud Al-Maqaleh, Taleb Al-Marri, Ahmad Al-Roalle, Lyes Arfa, Kyle Atkins, Carlos Barreiro, Micheal Barwegen, Isaak Bashevkin, Adam Kupsik, Juan Pablo Belatti, Gary Beswick, Daniele Bindoni, Zakaria Brinsi, Bruno Boschilia, Bruno Pires, Stuart Burt, Eduardo Cardozo, Gabriel Chade, Danilo Manis, Nicolas Danos, StĂ©phane De Almeida, Jan de Vries, Maximiliano Del Yesso, Christian Dietz, Boris Ditsoga, Jan Erik Engan, Rodrigo Figueiredo, Timur Gaynullin, Alexander Guzmán, Ahmed Hossam Taha, Bruno Jesus, Robert Kempter, TomaĹľ KlanÄŤnik, AndraĹľ KovaÄŤiÄŤ, George Lakrindis, Tomasz Listkiewicz, Walter LĂłpez, Luciano Maia, James Mainwaring, Mihai Marica, Brooke Mayo, Jun Mihara, Alberto MorĂn, David Morán, Juan Carlos Mora, Cyril Mugnier, Jose Enrique Naranjo Perez, Kathryn Nesbitt, Elvis Noupue, Adam Nunn, Michael OruĂ©, Benjamin Pagès, Corey Parker, Rafael Alves, MilcĂades SaldĂvar, Diego Sánchez, Zakhele Siwela, Andreas Söderkvist, Hessel Steegstra, Isaac Trevis, Andrey Tsapenko, Nicolás Tarán, Alberto Tegoni, Christian RamĂrez, Sandra RamĂrez, Mehdi Rahmouni, JosĂ© Retamal, Miguel Rocha, Facundo RodrĂguez, Mahbod Beigi, Tulio Moreno, Marco Bisguerra, Mokrane Gourari, Jerson Santos, Zhou Fei, Jorge Urrego, Caleb Wales, Abbes Akram Zerhouni, James Lindsay, Ferencz Tunyogi, Carlos Barreiro, Walter LĂłpez.
Note: FIFA’s official PDF is the controlling source for spellings and pairings; some third-party pages display accenting or ordering differently.
Official video match officials list (30)
Khamis Al-Marri, Abdullah Al-Shehri, Mahmoud Ashour, Ivan Bebek, JĂ©rĂ´me Brisard, Bastian Dankert, Carlos del Cerro Grande, Marco Di Bello, Joe Dickerson, Rob Dieperink, Hamza El Fariq, Shaun Evans, Fu Ming, Nicolás Gallo, Antonio GarcĂa, Jarred Gillett, Leodán González, Tatiana Guzmán, Dennis Higler, Tomasz Kwiatkowski, Juan Lara, Hernán Mastrángelo, Erick Miranda, Armando Villarreal, Guillermo Pacheco, Fedayi San, Juan Soto, Rodolpho Toski, Bram Van Driessche, Joe Dickerson.
Again, FIFA’s published PDF is the authoritative official list.
The VAR Verdict angle
The strongest editorial line here is not to turn this into a dry directory of names. The better angle is that FIFA has assembled the largest World Cup officiating team ever, and that automatically raises the bar on uniformity. A tournament with 104 matches across three countries will expose any gap between confederations, any inconsistency in foul threshold, and any lack of clarity in VAR intervention much faster than a smaller competition would. That is where this story becomes interesting for readers, not just searchable.
There is also a second layer: some of the biggest names on the referee list arrive with established reputations from Champions League, Copa América, major FIFA tournaments and elite domestic leagues. That gives FIFA experience at the top end, but it also means every high-profile appointment will be heavily scrutinised from day one. In other words, the list itself is official news; the real story starts when FIFA begins match-by-match assignments.
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