The competition was linked with the 2022–23 UEFA Nations League, which gave countries a secondary route to qualify for the final tournament.

[2] The format was similar to the UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying competition: the group stage decided 20 of the 23 teams that would advance to the final tournament to join host Germany.

The qualifying group stage was played in a home-and-away, round-robin format on double matchdays in March, June, September, October, and November 2023.

The three play-off path winners joined the twenty teams that already qualified for the final tournament through the group stage.

[8] If two or more teams were equal on points on completion of the group matches, the following tie-breaking criteria were applied:[8] Notes To determine the overall rankings of the European Qualifiers, results against teams in sixth place were discarded and the following criteria were applied:[8] Below was the schedule of the UEFA Euro 2024 qualifying campaign.

Host team Germany qualified directly to the final tournament, while it was confirmed on 20 September 2022 that Russia were ineligible due to the suspension from FIFA and UEFA competitions.

[17] The following restrictions were applied with computer assistance:[17] The teams were seeded based on the September 2022 UEFA Nations League overall rankings.

[20][21][22] The schedule was initially released on the day of the draw, but was withdrawn shortly after its distribution due to an alleged calendar issue.

[27] The team selection process determined the twelve teams that competed in the play-offs based on the Nations League overall rankings,[19] using a set of criteria that obeyed these principles:[8] Key The qualifying play-off draw took place on 23 November 2023, 12:00 CET, at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.

[31] Due to the specificity of the draw, the exact procedure could only be finalised following the conclusion of the qualifying group stage.