Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Sweden and Turkey as host countries were directly qualified. The eight best placed teams at the 2023 edition also gained direct entries into the tournament. 21 teams compete for the remaining 12 places at the final tournament.
All of the hosted countries' teams directly qualified for the tournament. Then, the top eight teams from previous edition also automatically qualified.
There being seven pools of either three teams each, the winners of each pool and the 5 best runners-up qualified for the 2026 European Championship. The pools were played in a double round-robin.
The pools were set following the Serpentine system according to their European Ranking for national teams as of 6 November 2023. Rankings are shown in brackets.[1]
If the tie continues as per the point ratio between two teams, the priority will be given to the team which won the last match between them. When the tie in points ratio is between three or more teams, a new classification of these teams in the terms of points 1, 2 and 3 will be made taking into consideration only the matches in which they were opposed to each other.
Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 match points for the winner, 0 match points for the loser Match won 3–2: 2 match points for the winner, 1 match point for the loser