Women’s Asia Cup 2026 Full Schedule, Groups, Points Table & Match Results

Last updated: September 2, 2026

Five matches into the group stage, the Women’s Asia Cup 2026 is already living up to the hype. Pakistan’s spinners just knocked Thailand out of semi-final contention, India survived a batting wobble to still win by 94 runs, and Indonesia have gotten their first taste of international T20 cricket after qualifying for a maiden Asia Cup appearance. If you’re trying to keep track of who’s playing whom and when, here’s the full picture – the schedule, the groups, the storylines, and how the tournament has actually played out so far.

What the Women’s Asia Cup Actually Is

Most casual cricket fans know the men’s Asia Cup. Fewer know that the women’s version has been running since 2004, when it started as little more than a two-team ODI series between India and Sri Lanka. It’s grown a lot since then. The Asian Cricket Council (ACC) now runs it as an eight-team tournament every two years, and since 2012 it’s been played entirely in the T20 format.

India has owned this competition for most of its history – seven titles out of nine editions. But the last two finals tell a different story. Bangladesh pulled off a genuine shock in 2018, and then Sri Lanka beat India in the 2024 final at Dambulla to win their first-ever Women’s Asia Cup title. That result changed the mood heading into 2026: India are no longer the automatic favorites, and everyone knows it.

Women’s Asia Cup 2026: The Basics

• Where: Dubai International Cricket Stadium, UAE – every single match, including the final, is played at this one venue
• When: August 28 to September 13, 2026
• Format: T20I, the tenth edition of the Women’s Asia Cup and the sixth to use the T20 format
• Teams: India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, UAE, Thailand, Hong Kong China, and first-time entrants Indonesia
• Defending champions: Sri Lanka
• Match time: 8:00 PM IST / 6:30 PM UAE local time, for every fixture
• Total matches: 15 – 12 group games, two semi-finals, one final

The format is simple enough. Two groups of four, everyone plays the other three teams in their group once, and the top two from each group go through to the semis.

Groups for the 2026 Tournament

Group A: India, Pakistan, Thailand, Hong Kong, China

Group B: Sri Lanka (defending champions), Bangladesh, UAE (hosts), Indonesia

On paper, Group A is the tougher of the two, with India and Pakistan both in it and the associate sides fighting for scraps. Group B looks more open – Sri Lanka are clearly the team to beat, but Bangladesh have a title of their own and won’t be pushovers.

Full Women’s Asia Cup Schedule 2026

Circle September 5 if you’re only watching one match – that’s India vs Pakistan, and it’s usually the most-watched fixture in the entire tournament regardless of form or ranking. The group stage wraps up September 8, there’s a two-day gap before the semis, and the final lands on a Sunday, which the ACC has done deliberately in past editions to maximize viewership.

How the Group Stage Has Actually Gone So Far

Schedules only tell you half the story, so here’s a proper catch-up on what’s happened on the field through the first five matches – not just who won, but the numbers that explain why.

Match 1 – Thailand beat Hong Kong China by 6 runs (Aug 28): Thailand posted 120 for 9 batting first, with captain Naruemol Chaiwai top-scoring and offspinner Onnicha Kamchomphu picking up three wickets to keep Hong Kong’s total in check. Hong Kong got to within touching distance, finishing on 114 for 7 off their full 20 overs, but couldn’t quite close the gap. Closer than most expected from the tournament’s two lowest-ranked Group A sides.

Match 2 – Sri Lanka beat UAE by 9 wickets (Aug 29): The defending champions made an early statement. UAE were bowled out for just 79, and Chamari Athapaththu finished the chase unbeaten on 48 as Sri Lanka got there in only 7.5 overs – with 12+ overs and nine wickets to spare. As emphatic a start as any team has had in the tournament.

Match 3 – India beat Thailand by 94 runs (Aug 30): India’s innings looked shaky for a stretch – a middle-order collapse saw them lose eight wickets for just 46 runs after a promising start from Shafali Verma, and they were held to 159 for 9. It barely mattered. Thailand were bowled out for just 65 in reply, handing India a comfortable 94-run win and a reminder that their bowling depth is a genuine asset even when the batting misfires.

Match 4 – Bangladesh beat Indonesia by 71 runs (Aug 31): Indonesia’s tournament debut didn’t go the way they’d have hoped, in the first-ever international meeting between these two sides. Bangladesh posted 129, then Nahida Akter and Marufa Akter shared five wickets between them to bowl Indonesia out for just 58.

Match 5 – Pakistan beat Thailand by 35 runs (Sep 1): This one mattered more than it looked on paper – a Thailand win here would have kept their semi-final hopes alive heading into the back half of the group stage. Thailand’s own bowler, Suleeporn Laomi, took three wickets to restrict Pakistan to 119 for 9 batting first, but it wasn’t enough. Chasing 120, Thailand fell apart against Pakistan’s spinners and were held to 84 for 8, with a composed 54 from Player of the Match Muneeba Ali doing the real damage with the bat beforehand.

That Thailand result is a useful reminder of how unforgiving this format is. With only three group games each, one bad night against a team you were expected to beat can end a campaign before the marquee fixtures even arrive.

Points Table and Net Run Rate (As of September 2)

Working through the scorecards above, here’s how the two groups actually stack up right now – Group A after three matches, Group B after two (Sri Lanka’s second game, against Indonesia, is being played today and isn’t reflected yet).

Group A

Group B

The Group A table is the more interesting one to sit with. Three different teams – India, Pakistan, and Thailand – are all level on two points, and net run rate is the only thing separating them at the top. Thailand technically have as many points as the group’s two biggest teams, but their NRR has been dragged into negative territory by back-to-back defeats, which means realistically they need to beat Hong Kong on September 7 and hope results elsewhere fall their way. Pakistan’s win margin against Thailand also gives them a healthier cushion than India currently has, even though India’s single result – that 94-run demolition of Thailand – produced the best NRR figure of anyone in the tournament so far.

Group B is more straightforward for now: Sri Lanka and Bangladesh have both won comfortably, UAE and Indonesia have both lost heavily, and today’s Sri Lanka–Indonesia match will start reshuffling things.

Teams Worth Watching

India come in as the record seven-time champions but also as the team with the most to prove after a group-stage exit at the 2026 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup. Harmanpreet Kaur’s side has the batting depth on paper – Shafali Verma, Smriti Mandhana, Deepti Sharma – but their middle-order collapse against Thailand shows the same fragility that’s cropped up in recent tournaments. Whether that gets fixed before September 5 is probably the single biggest question of the group stage.

Sri Lanka are the team everyone else is chasing. Chamari Athapaththu remains one of the most dangerous batters in world T20 cricket, not just Asian cricket, and the way Sri Lanka dismantled the UAE in their opener suggests the title defense is off to a good start.

Pakistan have been the nearly-team of this tournament for over a decade – runners-up in 2012 and 2016, always competitive, never quite good enough to win it. Fatima Sana’s return as captain and a clinical win over Thailand suggest this squad has genuine belief heading into the India match.

Bangladesh remain the only team besides India and Sri Lanka to have actually won this thing, back in 2018. Their bowling looked sharp against Indonesia, and their September 6 fixture against Sri Lanka could end up deciding who tops Group B.

Thailand, Hong Kong China, UAE, and Indonesia are playing a different game entirely – most of their value here is in the experience against full-member nations, not the trophy itself. Thailand’s loss to Pakistan has already made their route to the semis extremely narrow, but Hong Kong’s opening defeat by six runs shows the gap is closing, not widening.

Past Women’s Asia Cup Winners

Looking at that table, the pattern is obvious: India dominated for two decades, and then the last two editions broke the mold completely. That’s part of what makes 2026 interesting – for the first time in a while, there isn’t an obvious favorite walking into the final week.

How to Watch

Broadcast rights vary a lot by region, so your best bet is checking your usual cricket streaming service or broadcaster in your country closer to matchday – coverage for South Asian audiences tends to go through the major regional sports networks and their streaming apps, while international viewers typically get ball-by-ball updates and highlights through the ACC’s official channels and established cricket sites. Since kickoff is fixed at 8:00 PM IST for every match, converting that to your own time zone is the easiest way to plan around the big fixtures.

Frequently Asked Questions

Final Thought

Five matches in, the Women’s Asia Cup 2026 has already delivered a genuine upset scare, a batting collapse from the tournament favorites, and one associate side’s semi-final hopes taking an early hit. With the India-Pakistan blockbuster still to come on September 5 and the knockout stage starting September 10, there’s a lot of cricket left to shape who actually lifts the trophy on September 13. Bookmark the schedule above and check back as the group stage tightens up.

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