It was the first women's Rugby World Cup to be hosted by New Zealand, and by a country in the Southern Hemisphere.

The tournament introduced changes such as replacement of classification play-offs in the knockout stage with quarter-finals,[1][2] and a longer scheduling window with at least five days between matches.

On 2 March 2021, World Rugby announced that the tournament would be postponed to 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as "it has become clear in recent discussions with key partners including New Zealand Rugby, the New Zealand government and participating unions, that, given the scale of the event and the COVID-19 related uncertainties, it is just not possible to deliver the environment for all teams to be the best that they can be on the sport's greatest stage."

New Zealand's Zero-COVID policy at the time also meant that teams would have been subject to strict quarantine arrangements in order to enter the country, whose international borders were closed.

A further six teams (England, France, United States, Canada, Australia and Wales) qualified automatically as top seven finishers at the 2017 tournament.

[9] On 21 September 2022, World Rugby released the list of appointments for the pool phase—New Zealander Maggie Cogger-Orr was selected to oversee the opening match of the tournament.

[10] On 8 November 2022, World Rugby announced that Scottish referee Hollie Davidson would adjudicate the final.

The draw, hosted by sports pundit and former English and British and Irish Lions international Ugo Monye and sports journalist and presenter Elma Smit, was conducted on 20 November 2020 in the SkyCity Theatre in Auckland, and used the World Rankings as of 1 January 2020, before the global outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.