According to the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), the AFC Champions League Elite will adopt a new competition format. Each team will be required to play two matches against clubs from each seeding pot.

In an official document, the AFC wrote:

“To enhance competitive fairness across its club competitions, the AFC has introduced a number of structural reform measures. From the 2026/27 season, the AFC Champions League Elite will follow an updated set of core principles in its scheduling arrangements under the new competition format, which will see the number of participating clubs expanded to 32 teams.

Based on the draw results, each club will play two matches against clubs from each seeding pot. The draw will now feature four pots instead of the previous two.

To ensure absolute competitive fairness, the final matchdays of the league stage will see simultaneous kick-offs across the East and West regions respectively.”

Starting from the 2024/25 season, the former AFC Champions League was rebranded as the AFC Champions League Elite, with the number of participating teams reduced from 40 to 24. The competition was divided into East and West regions, with 12 teams in each region.

Under the new format, each club plays eight different opponents from its own region during the league stage, with four home matches and four away matches.

In April 2026, the AFC confirmed that the AFC Champions League Elite would expand to 32 teams, with 16 clubs from the East region and 16 from the West region.

For the 2026/27 season, the Chinese Super League representatives in the AFC Champions League Elite will be Shanghai Port, who won the previous CSL title, and Beijing Guoan, who qualified through the Chinese FA Cup (subject to the qualifying round).