📌 AFCON 2027 at a glance: 19 June – 17 July 2027 across Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda — the first three-nation AFCON and the first in the CECAFA region since Ethiopia in 1976. Twenty-four teams from a qualifying field of 48. Both Tanzania and Uganda license online gambling, unlike most of the continent. It is also the last edition played in an odd-numbered year; from 2028 the tournament moves to a four-year cycle.
The 2027 Africa Cup of Nations runs from 19 June to 17 July 2027, staged by three countries for the first time in the tournament’s history. Here are the confirmed dates and venues, how qualification works and where it stands, the historical record, and how betting regulation and payments actually work across Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
The 36th Africa Cup of Nations runs from 19 June to 17 July 2027, and it is the first in the competition's history to be staged by three countries at once: Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Twenty-four teams, ten stadiums, seven host cities. The sponsored name is the TotalEnergies CAF Africa Cup of Nations PAMOJA 2027 — pamoja being Swahili for "together".
It carries two other firsts. It is the first AFCON held in the CECAFA region in roughly five decades, since Ethiopia hosted in 1976. And it is the last edition to be played in an odd-numbered year: from 2028 the tournament moves to a four-year cycle. It also falls on the competition's 70th anniversary.
Morocco go in as defending champions, having been awarded the 2025 title on appeal by CAF's appeal board after Senegal was stripped of it, despite Senegal winning the final 1–0 — a result that still colours how the next edition is being talked about.
The first Africa Cup of Nations was played in February 1957 in Khartoum, Sudan, with three teams. Egypt won it, beating Ethiopia 4–0 in the final. Seventy years later the tournament returns to the same broad region, and Sudan sit top of their qualifying group.
The field has grown in stages. The most recent expansion came in July 2017, when CAF under president Ahmad Ahmad took the tournament from 16 teams to 24. That change took effect at the 2019 edition and holds for 2027.
If you are betting on an outright winner, the historical distribution matters more than recent form, because AFCON is unusually top-heavy.
Egypt lead with seven titles (1957, 1959, 1986, 1998, 2006, 2008, 2010), including three in a row between 2006 and 2010. Cameroon have five, Ghana four, and Nigeria and Ivory Coast three each. Morocco have two — 1976 and 2025.
That is 24 titles shared among six nations. The pattern is worth knowing before a bookmaker's outright market makes a mid-table side look like value.
Qualifying began with a preliminary round from 25 to 31 March 2026 — six two-legged ties among the lowest-ranked entrants, those placed 43rd to 54th. The six winners joined the main draw.
That produced a group stage of 12 groups of four, 48 teams in total, including the three hosts. Each group plays home and away across six matchdays, three points for a win, one for a draw. Twenty-four teams reach the finals, with Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda already there as hosts.
The hosts qualified automatically — Kenya was confirmed on 27 September 2023, with Tanzania and Uganda also through as co-hosts.
As of the most recent update to the qualification standings on 25 September 2026, the group leaders were Morocco (A), Malawi (B), Ivory Coast (C), South Africa (D), DR Congo (E), Mauritania (F), Cameroon (G), Botswana (H, level on a single point with Libya, Uganda and Tunisia), Algeria (I), Sudan (J), Mali and Rwanda tied (K) and Guinea-Bissau (L). No non-host had secured qualification at that point.
Two of those names are worth flagging for anyone watching the odds: Guinea-Bissau leading a group and Botswana topping theirs are not the historical pattern. Groups B, H and K were the tightest.
The remaining qualifying schedule runs as follows:
Matchdays 1–2: 21 September to 6 October 2026, with the first matchday beginning 26 September.
Matchdays 3–4: 9 to 17 November 2026.
Matchdays 5–6: 22 to 30 March 2027.
A note on sourcing: CAF's own published roadmap and the qualification tables do not agree perfectly on when the final matchdays fall — one framing places matchdays five and six in the November 2026 window. The dates above follow the qualification standings, which carry the more specific and more recently updated schedule. We will correct this page if CAF publishes a definitive revision.
Either way, the field is not settled until the spring. The draw for the finals follows, and that is the point at which fixture-level markets open.
Kenya concentrates everything in Nairobi: the new Raila Odinga International Stadium (60,000), the Moi International Sports Centre (60,000 after renovation) and Nyayo National Stadium (30,000). Eldoret and Kakamega were considered and excluded.
Tanzania spreads across the mainland and the islands — Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam (60,000), the new Samia Suluhu Hassan Stadium in Arusha (30,000), and two Zanzibar venues, Amaan Stadium (15,000) and Fumba Stadium (35,000).
Uganda has the single largest ground of the tournament: Mandela National Stadium in Kampala, at a planned 64,125 after renovation, with Hoima City Stadium and Akii Bua Stadium in Lira completing the set at 20,000 each.
Tanzania is one of the few African markets where online gambling is explicitly licensed rather than left undefined. The Gaming Board of Tanzania issues internet casino and internet sports betting licences under the Gaming (Internet Gaming) Regulations 2022, sitting under the Gaming Act Cap. 41. As of 23 September 2026 the Board's register listed 39 companies holding an online licence.
Online operators pay 25% of gross gaming revenue. Players face a 15% withholding tax on winnings from 1 July 2026, deducted by the operator rather than declared by the player. A proposed 5% excise duty on stakes appeared in the Finance Bill 2026 but did not pass into the Finance Act, so it is not in force.
One scope detail matters here: the Gaming Act covers Mainland Tanzania only. Zanzibar — where the Amaan and Fumba venues sit — operates under separate arrangements. Full Tanzania guide →
Uganda runs everything through a single regulator, the National Lotteries and Gaming Regulatory Board, under the Lotteries and Gaming Act 2016. Online sports betting and online casino are both licensed verticals, with fees starting from roughly €2,500 per vertical.
The detail worth knowing as a player: licences expire on 31 December of the year they are issued, with renewals due at least two months before. That is a short cycle, and it means an operator's licensed status is worth re-checking rather than assuming it carries over. Full Uganda guide →
Kenya brings the region's most established betting market and, more importantly for how money actually moves, the deepest mobile money infrastructure on the continent.
Kenyan mobile money subscriptions passed 54 million as of June 2026, up 13.2% year on year, with M-Pesa holding roughly 88.8% of the market. In practical terms, mobile money reaches further than banking does, and for a tournament audience that is the rail everything else connects to. Full Kenya guide →
The regulatory positions differ; the payment story does not. Mobile money is the entry point in all three countries — M-Pesa in Kenya and Tanzania, MTN Mobile Money and Airtel Money in Uganda, with Tigo Pesa and HaloPesa also active in Tanzania.
For players using international platforms, the route is consistent: mobile money into a peer-to-peer exchange, swap into USDT, then deposit on the TRC20 network.
The reason it is TRC20 and not ERC20 is arithmetic rather than preference. TRC20 transfer fees stay under a dollar and confirmation lands in roughly one to three minutes. Ethereum network fees can exceed the deposit itself at East African stake sizes — a point that sounds technical until you watch a 500-shilling deposit lose a third of its value to gas. What is USDT TRC20? →
Three things are worth settling in advance, because all three get harder to do once a tournament is running.
Licence status. In Uganda in particular, licences lapse annually. Check the current register rather than a badge on a website footer.
Withdrawal route. Test a small withdrawal before you have a balance worth caring about. The time to discover a platform's payout behaviour is not after a winning accumulator.
Tax treatment. In Tanzania, 15% comes off winnings at source. That is not a platform taking a cut — it is statutory, and it changes what a quoted price actually returns.
AFCON draws betting volume from well outside the host region. The competing nations bring their own markets with them — Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, Morocco, South Africa, Egypt and the rest — and each has a different regulatory and payment picture.
We maintain market guides for twelve African countries. Several of those nations are currently leading their qualifying groups, which makes their markets the ones most likely to be active across June and July 2027.
Major tournaments are when occasional betting becomes frequent betting. The minimum age is 18 across all three host countries.
Decide what a month of the tournament is worth to you before it starts, and treat that as the ceiling rather than the opening position. A licensed market gives you recourse; it does not give you better odds, and it does not make a losing run shorter. Support is available through BeGambleAware and GamCare.
The 2027 Africa Cup of Nations runs from 19 June to 17 July 2027. It is the 36th edition and the competition's 70th anniversary.
Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda co-host, the first time three countries have staged the tournament together. Ten stadiums across seven host cities are listed.
Twenty-four. Qualifying involved 48 teams across 12 groups of four, following a preliminary round in March 2026. Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda qualified automatically as hosts.
The qualification standings place matchdays five and six on 22 to 30 March 2027, with matchdays three and four on 9 to 17 November 2026. CAF's published roadmap and the qualification tables do not agree perfectly on this point, so treat the March dates as the better-sourced version and expect a definitive CAF confirmation.
Egypt, with seven: 1957, 1959, 1986, 1998, 2006, 2008 and 2010. Cameroon have five, Ghana four, and Nigeria and Ivory Coast three each. Morocco have two and are the defending champions.
Tanzania and Uganda both license online gambling. Tanzania does so through the Gaming Board of Tanzania under the Internet Gaming Regulations 2022, with 39 online licensees listed as of September 2026. Uganda licenses through the National Lotteries and Gaming Regulatory Board under the Lotteries and Gaming Act 2016. Kenya has the region's most established betting market.
A 15% withholding tax on winnings applies from 1 July 2026, deducted by the operator before payout. Operators separately pay 25% of gross gaming revenue.
Mandela National Stadium in Kampala, Uganda, at a planned capacity of 64,125 after renovation. Kenya's Raila Odinga International Stadium and Moi International Sports Centre, and Tanzania's Benjamin Mkapa Stadium, are each listed at 60,000.
From 2028 the Africa Cup of Nations moves to a four-year cycle, so 2027 is the final tournament staged in an odd-numbered year.
Mobile money is the entry point — M-Pesa in Kenya and Tanzania, MTN Mobile Money and Airtel Money in Uganda. From there the common route is a peer-to-peer exchange into USDT, deposited on the TRC20 network, where fees stay under a dollar and confirmation takes roughly one to three minutes.