Immediately following the 2025 IIHF World Championship in Stockholm and Herning, the updated World Rankings provided the basis for next year’s groups. When revealing these groups, The Hockey News was careful to point out that the local organizing committee has the option to switch two of the teams in order to boost attendance.
On Wednesday, the IIHF announced the following groups for the 2026 World Championship in Zurich and Fribourg, Switzerland. They are:
Group A, Zurich: (2) USA, (3) Switzerland, (7) Finland, (8) Germany, (11) Latvia, (12) Austria, (18) Hungary, (19) Great Britain.
Group B, Fribourg: (4) Canada, (5) Sweden, (6) Czechia, (9) Denmark, (10) Slovakia, (13) Norway, (17) Slovenia, (20) Italy.
From the groups that were originally forecast, Swiss organizers have decided to swap second-ranked USA with fourth-ranked Canada, sending the USA to the primary venue in Zurich and Canada to Fribourg.
It should be noted that top-ranked Russia and 16th-ranked Belarus are both indefinitely suspended by the IIHF, officially for safety and security reasons. Seeds 14 and 15, Kazakhstan and France, finished last in their groups this year and have been relegated to Division I, Group A.
Next year’s World Championship runs from May 15 to 31, 2026.
Photo © Annegret Hilse-Imagn Images: Switzerland and Finland, shown here battling during the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, will both compete in Group A in Zurich in the 2026 IIHF World Championship.
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