2019 AFC Asian Cup qualification
| Tournament details | |
|---|---|
| Dates | 12 March 2015 – 27 March 2018 |
| Teams | 45 (from 1 confederation) |
| Tournament statistics | |
| Matches played | 180 |
| Goals scored | 577 (3.21 per match) |
| Attendance | 2,478,041 (13,767 per match) |
| Top scorer(s) |
 Mohammad Al-Sahlawi (14 goals)
|
The 2019 AFC Asian Cup qualification is the qualification process organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) to determine the participating teams for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup, the 17th edition of the international men's football championship of Asia. For the first time, the Asian Cup final tournament will be contested by 24 teams, having been expanded from the 16-team format that had been used since 2004.
The qualification process will involve four rounds, where the first two doubled as the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification for Asian teams.
The proposal to merge the preliminary qualification rounds for FIFA World Cup qualifiers with those for the Asian Cup was ratified by the AFC Competitions Committee.
The qualification structure is as follows:
The play-off round represented a change from the initially announced qualification format – which saw the remaining fourth-placed teams and the four best group fifth-placed teams also advance to the third round.
46 FIFA-affiliated nations from the AFC entered qualification. In order to determine which nations would compete in the first round and which nations would receive a bye through to the second round, the FIFA World Rankings of January 2015 were used (shown in parentheses).
Due to the joint format of the FIFA World Cup qualifiers and AFC Asian Cup qualifiers, the hosts of the 2019 AFC Asian Cup, the United Arab Emirates also entered the second round of AFC Asian Cup qualifiers despite having qualified automatically.
The schedule of the qualification competition is as follows.
The draw for the first round was held on 10 February 2015, 15:30 MST (UTC+8), at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The six teams eliminated from this stage progressed to the 2016 AFC Solidarity Cup.
The draw for the second round was held on 14 April 2015, 17:00 MST (UTC+8), at the JW Marriott Hotel in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
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