English Football Ups & Downs 2025-26: Promotions, Relegations & European Places

Here are the English Football Promotions, Relegations & European Places for the 2025-26 season.

Updated May 26, 2026, with all the results in.

Here are all the promotions, relegations and European qualification places in English football after the 2025-26 English season, from the Premier League down to the fifth tier, the National League.

Jump to:

• Premier League European places
• Premier League relegation
• Championship promotion
• Championship relegation
• League One promotion
• League One relegation
• League Two promotion
• League Two relegation
• National League promotion
• How promotion and relegation works

Related posts:

• 2026-27 Promotions and Relegations in Other European Leagues
• When will we know the 2026-27 Premier League fixtures, and when does the season start?
• A map of all the clubs in the top six tiers of English football.
• Promotions and Relegations in the 2024-25 Season

Which Premier League Teams Qualified for European Places in 2025-26?

“Getting into Europe” means qualifying for the Champions League, Europa League or Conference League.

The simple version: The top five Premier League teams go to Champions League. No. 6 goes to Europa League, along with the FA Cup winner, and the League Cup winner goes to Conference League.

For the 2025-26 season, Manchester City won the FA Cup, so their spot in the Europa League went to the seventh-place team, Sunderland — who were in League One three years ago! Since City also won the EFL Cup, their Conference League spot went to the #8 team, Brighton and Hove Albion.

Crystal Palace are in the final of the Conference League on May 27. If they win that, they make next season’s Europa League — but nothing else changes here.

Note: All the club-name links below lead to Groundhopper Guides’ profile of each club.

Here is the top of the final 2025-26 Premier League table:

1. Arsenal — Champions League and Premier League Champions. (Buy Arsenal tickets)
2. Manchester City — Champions League. (Buy Man City tickets)
3. Manchester United — Champions League (Buy Man United tickets)
4. Aston Villa — Champions League (Buy Aston Villa Tickets)
5. Liverpool — Champions League (Buy Liverpool tickets)
6. Bournemouth — Europa League (Buy Bournemouth tickets)
7. Sunderland — Europa League (!) because Manchester City won the FA Cup and Bournemouth took their place here.
8. Brighton — Conference League because City also won the League Cup, so Brighton took their spot here.

No. 15 Crystal Palace will be in the Europa League because they won the 2025-26 Conference League. (Buy Crystal Palace tickets)

Relegated From Premier League to the Championship, 2025-26 Season

• West Ham (Buy West Ham tickets)
• Burnley (Buy Burnley tickets)
• Wolverhampton Wanderers (Buy Wolverhampton tickets)

Promoted from the Championship to the Premier League, 2025-26 Season

Here is the schedule for the 25-26 EFL promotion playoffs, which ran from May 8 to 25.

• Coventry City as champions
• Ipswich Town
• Hull City via the playoffs.

Relegated from the Championship to League One, 2025-26 Season

• Oxford United
• Leicester City
• Sheffield Wednesday

Promoted from League One to the Championship, 2025-26 Season

• Lincoln City go to the second tier for the first time since 1961! That is their ground, Sincil Bank, at the top of this post.
• Cardiff City
• Bolton Wanderers via the playoffs.

Relegated from League One to League Two, 2025-26 Season

• Exeter City
• Port Vale
• Rotherham
• Northampton Town

Promoted from League Two to League One, 2025-26 Season

• Bromley go to the third tier for the first time in their 134-year history!
• MK Dons
• Cambridge United
• Notts County via the playoffs.

Relegated from League Two to the National League, 2025-26 Season

• Harrogate Town
• Barrow

Promotion from National League to Football League Two

• York City as champions, after they scored an equalizer in the 113th minute at Rochdale on the last day!
• Rochdale via penalty kicks in the promotion final after scoring a 97th-minute equalizer.

National League Playoffs Fixtures and Results:

• April 28: Scunthorpe United 1-0 Southend United.
• April 29: Boreham Wood 1-0 Forest Green Rovers
• May 3:
  • Carlisle United 1-2 Boreham Wood
  • Rochdale 2-1 Scunthorpe

The 2026 National League Promotion Final was on May 10: Rochdale 2-2 Boreham Wood, Rochdale won 3-1 in a penalty shootout.

Here are the locations for the all the English football clubs in the top 6 tiers for the 2026-27 season:

How Promotion and Relegation Works in English Football

For a video version of how promotion and relegation works in England, see below.

Short version: The top two or three teams go up automatically, and another goes up via the promotion playoffs. From the National League, one goes up automatically and another via the playoffs. In all cases, the bottom two or (usually) three go down.

For a fuller explanation in writing, check out our post all about the English promotion and relegation system.

The Football League and Promotion Playoff Schedule

In the Football League — Championship, League One and League Two — the last day of the season was Saturday, May 2.

The Football League playoffs ran from May 8 to May 25. Here is the full Football League promotion playoff schedule.