World Cup Finals 2026
90 leaders and 90 followers. Four rounds. One champion per role. This is how the title is decided: the format, what the judges look for, how their scores become results, the music, and the rules for the day.
Format
Four rounds, each one smaller and more demanding than the last. Fewer partner switches as the rounds go on, so the judges see more of each dance.
Leaders and followers are ranked separately.
Heats are drawn at random, never by bib order. With 21 partners in one heat you dance with almost everyone, so one difficult partnership cannot define your round.
Two heats drawn at random, scored as one round: every judge ranks all 45 dancers together, so it does not matter which heat you land in.
Longer partnerships, so the judges see how a dance develops and not only how it starts. From here the whole panel scores both roles.
Three phases. The finalists dance with each other, then each role dances with the judges of the other role while the rest of the finalists watch and rank them. Connection is best judged from inside the dance.
Judging criteria
Five pillars, all weighing the same. Judges give one overall score guided by them.
The base the whole dance sits on, and it has to be bachata.
Timing, weight transfer, grounding, posture, and a basic that really works at any tempo. We are looking for bachata: the dance has to be recognisable as bachata from the first step, whatever style you bring to it.
How the body executes what it is asked to do.
Balance, axis, turns, footwork, body movement, lines, and how clearly a lead or a follow is executed. A simple movement done to a high standard scores above a difficult one done roughly.
Everything that only exists because there are two of you.
Adapting to a partner you have never danced with, building the dance together instead of one person deciding it, and making it comfortable and safe for the person in your arms.
Turning what you hear into what you dance.
Phrasing, accents and breaks, dynamics, instruments, pauses, and changing what you do because of what the song is doing right now.
Attitude, styling and creativity.
Presence and attitude, styling and movement textures, and the creativity to improvise instead of repeating. Looking like yourself rather than a copy.
Scoring
Results use relative placement, the system of the biggest Jack and Jill competitions in the world. Your placement depends on how many judges put you ahead of the others, never on the sum of their points.
Each judge gives you one overall score from 0 to 10, in steps of 0.1. There are no separate marks per criterion.
Each judge's scores are turned into that judge's own ranking, leaders and followers separately. A strict judge's 7.0 and a generous judge's 9.5 weigh the same if both mean "my favourite".
A place is yours when a majority of your judges rank you at that place or better. Points are never added up, so no single judge can carry or sink you.
The top dancers of the whole round advance, per role. Not the top of each heat.
Music
Songs are never shared in advance. The mix reflects what you hear at a bachata social today, so expect to move between eras and styles inside the same round.
The post-covid sound of the floor
From the Bronx sound to the years bachata went global
Bachata over pop, R&B and urban songs, often sung in English: the fusion sound of today's floors.
The original Dominican sound, whatever the year: requinto guitar leading, güira and bongó up front, the mambo section that makes you move, and the amargue in the voice, heartbreak sung the way it was born in the barrio.
Rules
With 180 dancers, the competition only flows if everyone is where they need to be, when they need to be there. We run on time and we do not wait.
See you on the floor in Geneva
