The eight group winners and the four best group runners-up advanced to the third round of FIFA World Cup qualification as well as qualify for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup finals.

The draw for the second round was held on 14 April 2015, at 17:00 MST (UTC+8), at the JW Marriott Hotel in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

[3][4] The seeding was based on the FIFA World Rankings of April 2015 (shown in parentheses below).

The fixtures of each group were automatically decided based on the respective pot of each team.

As the seeding order was based on the most recent FIFA Rankings prior to the draw, it differed from the order in the AFC entrant list, which was based on the FIFA World Rankings of January 2015.