Home International Championship
| Founded | 1884 |
|---|---|
| Abolished | 1984 |
| Region | United Kingdom |
| Number of teams | 4 |
| Last champions |
 Northern Ireland (1983–84) |
| Most successful team(s) |
 England (54 titles) |
The British Home Championship was an annual football competition contested between the United Kingdom's four national teams: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (the last of whom competed as Ireland for most of the competition's history). Starting during the 1883–84 season, it is the oldest international football tournament and it was contested until the 1983–84 season, when it was abolished after 100 years.
By the early 1880s, the development of football in the United Kingdom was gathering pace and the four national football teams of the UK were playing regular friendlies against each other, with nearly every team playing all the others annually. At the time, the football associations of each Home Nation (The Football Association (England), the Scottish Football Association, the Football Association of Wales and the Irish Football Association) had slightly different rules for football, and when matches were played the rules of whoever was the home team were used. While this solution was workable, it was hardly ideal. To remedy this, the four associations met in Manchester on 6 December 1882 and agreed on one uniform set of worldwide rules. They also established the International Football Association Board (IFAB) to approve changes to the rules (a task that it still performs to this day).
The new rules meant that formal international competitions could now easily be devised. Thus, at the same meeting, the associations formalised the annual friendlies and the British Home Championship – the world's first international football competition – was born.
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