− Special Series Soccer Edition World Cup stories, beyond the scores from across the NPR Network Follow the World Cup in the NPR App Find Your Station Sign up for Up First for Soccer Edition on Tuesdays The 2026 FIFA World Cup is from June 11 to July 19, 2026.
+ Special Series Soccer Edition Follow the World Cup in the NPR App Find Your Station Sign up for Up First for Soccer Edition on Tuesdays The 2026 FIFA World Cup is from June 11 to July 19, 2026.
Sixteen host cities across North America, including Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Seattle, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Boston, Kansas City, Miami, and New York/New Jersey in the United States. The NPR Network will have coverage from across the country leading up to and during the championship. Referees at the World Cup have new rules to whistle during games June 12, 20265:00 AM ET Russell Lewis
FIFA match officials, including Slovene referee Slavko Vincic, shown here issuing a yellow card in March, will have new rules to apply during the World Cup. Michael Campanella/Getty Images hide caption
LOS ANGELES — The referees chosen to work the 2026 World Cup have some new tools to speed up the games and ensure that any match-altering officiating mistakes are corrected.
Soccer Edition World Cup facts and figures to get you sounding like an expert Among the many changes that fans will see during the World Cup:
The chairman of the FIFA Referees Committee, Pierluigi Collina, has long focused on time-wasting during games. At the last World Cup, four years ago in Qatar, he ensured that stoppage time was properly added during the competition. Some 90-minute matches saw as much as a half hour of added time.
There's another technological improvement that viewers will notice at this World Cup: Officials will wear an eye-level video headset, so fans can see a replay of the action as the referee saw it during key decisions.
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