This tournament featured clubs from Liga MX who did not participate in the 2015-16 CONCACAF Champions League (América, Querétaro, Santos Laguna and UANL)[3] or the 2016 Copa Libertadores (UNAM, Toluca, Puebla).
The top 13 Ascenso MX in the Apertura 2015 classification table also qualified to the tournament.
An extra point is awarded for every round won; a round is won by aggregated score, and if it is a tie, the extra point will be awarded to the team with higher number of goals scored away.
[5] All times are UTC−06:00 except for matches in Cancún (UTC−05:00), Ciudad Juárez, Sinaloa, Tepic (all UTC−07:00) and Tijuana (UTC−08:00)
If two or more teams are equal on points on completion of the group matches, the following criteria are applied to determine the rankings: The eight clubs that advance to this stage will be ranked and seeded 1 to 8 based on performance in the group stage.