The qualifying format has changed since the 2018 edition, and the teams are no longer divided into regional zones.

As a result, the following changes to the tournament were made:[8] The draw for the group stage took place on 19 April 2019, 11:00 EDT (UTC−4), at the CONCACAF Headquarters in Miami.

[7] Based on the CONCACAF Women's Under-20 Ranking, the 16 teams were distributed into four pots, with teams in Pot 1 assigned to each group prior to the draw, as follows:[9] Following the exclusion of Costa Rica and Panama from the tournament, their vacated positions in the group stage were replaced by Guyana and Saint Kitts and Nevis respectively.

Furthermore, the vacated positions in the round of 16 of Guyana and Saint Kitts and Nevis were replaced by Bermuda and Barbados respectively.

The fourth CONCACAF team to qualify for the 2021 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup, which would initially have been co-hosts Panama (which had pulled out of hosting), was not confirmed.