Although the tournament has used a variety of different formats, a final qualification event has been a feature of every World Cup since 1979.

Until 2015, automatic qualification was granted to all full members of the ICC.

However, for the 2019 Cricket World Cup, only the top eight teams in the ICC ODI Championship were given automatic qualification, meaning ICC full members played in the Qualifier for the first time.

Historically performance at the World Cup Qualifier has been a key determinant for elevation to full membership of the ICC and Test status, with Sri Lanka (1981), Zimbabwe (1992) and Bangladesh (2000) being awarded full membership after ICC Trophy wins.

In September 2018, the ICC confirmed that all matches in the ICC World Cup Qualifier will have ODI status, regardless if a team does not have ODI status prior to the start of an individual tournament event.