The tournament was held in the bicentenary year of the purported invention of the sport by William Webb Ellis.

The defending champions were South Africa, who defeated England in the 2019 Rugby World Cup final.

World Rugby requested that any members wishing to host the 2023 event were to submit an expression of interest by June 2015.

[7] This list was later reduced to nine cities (excluding Paris, Montpellier, and Lens): Source:[8] Twenty teams competed.

[9] In Oceania and Asia, traditional middle powers emerged, with Samoa claiming the region's place at the World Cup (Fiji, New Zealand and Australia having automatically qualified).

Tonga, the second Oceanian team, then won a playoff against Hong Kong, the highest ranked Asian representative, to claim their ninth appearance at a Rugby World Cup.

Similarly, the United States found themselves excluded from the competition for the first time since 1995, representing a notable departure from previous editions.

On 18 November 2022, Portugal won the repechage tournament, overcoming Kenya, Hong Kong and the United States to be the last country to qualify for the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

¹as of 4 September 2023 post warm-up matches Each team could submit a squad of 33 players for the tournament, an increase from 31 that was allowed in 2019.

[10] The draw returned to its traditional place of the year following the previous World Cup, after the end-of-year internationals.

[14] Amongst the squad, Wayne Barnes officiated at a record fifth Rugby World Cup, while Nika Amashukeli became the first Georgian referee in the World Cup and first Tier 2 representative to referee a game since the game turned professional.

New Zealand France Italy Uruguay Namibia South Africa Ireland Scotland Tonga Romania Wales Australia Fiji Georgia Portugal England Japan Argentina Samoa Chile Points allocation in pool stage For clarification, in the case of a tie between three or more Teams at the end of the pool phase, once the highest ranked Team has been determined following the above criteria, to determine the next higher ranked Team the process would repeat, starting at the first criterion.