The final is played at the Stade de France and the winner qualifies for the group stage of the UEFA Europa League and a place in the Trophée des Champions match.

Combined with random draws and one-off matches (no replays), the Coupe de France can be difficult for the bigger clubs to win.

Despite this advantage, only three amateur clubs have reached the final since professionalism was introduced in French football in 1932: Calais RUFC in 2000, US Quevilly in 2012 and Les Herbiers VF in 2018.

Due to the initial increase in clubs, the federation created preliminary rounds beginning with the 1919–20 season.

The following year, the final returned to Colombes and remained there until moving to the Parc des Princes permanently following its renovation, which made it the largest in terms of attendance in France.

One of the competition's biggest upsets occurred in February 1957 when Algerian club SCU El Biar defeated Stade de Reims who had players such as Robert Jonquet, Michel Hidalgo, Léon Glovacki, and Just Fontaine.

Calais, composed of doctors, dock workers, and office clerks, started the competition in the 5th round and, after defeating fellow amateurs, beat clubs Lille, Langon-Castets, Cannes, Strasbourg, and Bordeaux to advance to the final.

More recently, amateur clubs have begun to move to more established stadiums for their Coupe de France matches with their primary reason being to earn more money at the gate due to more established stadiums having the ability to carry more spectators.

[6] Since 1927, the President of France has always attended the cup final and presented the trophy to the winning team's captain.

Similar to other countries' cup competitions, the Coupe de France is a knockout tournament with pairings for each round drawn at random.

[7] Prior to 1967, the competition had no extra time nor penalty shootouts and instead allowed replays, similar to the FA Cup.

[8] However, rounds in the competition are determined through each region in France with one of the main reasons being to reduce travel costs.

All of the clubs are then split and drawn against each other randomly, regardless of regional affiliation though geographical pots are made prior to the draw.

Among them include SFR, Caisse d'Épargne, Crédit Agricole, Sita-Suez, Carrefour,[10] LG, Hyundai, and Coca-Cola.

Éric Pécout of Nantes and Jean-Pierre Papin are joint top scorers of the competition final, having each converted a hat-trick in their only appearances in the ultimate match.

In 1947, Roger Vandooren scored the fastest goal in the final's history converting after 29 seconds for his club Lille in their 2–0 win over Strasbourg.