The women's water polo tournament at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing was held from 11 August to 21 August at the Ying Tung Natatorium.

[1] Teams from eight nations competed, seeded into two groups for the preliminary round.

Eight games were played in the final round.

The first-place team in each pool qualified directly for the semifinal, the second- and third-place teams moved on to the quarterfinal round, and the fourth-place teams played each other in a seventh place game.

[3] The winners of the quarterfinal games moved on to the semifinals to face the top teams from each pool, while the quarterfinal losers played a fifth place classification game.