| Updated: September 18, 2025The return of the UEFA Champions League in its new league phase format brings a fresh kind of challenge – one measured not by points or goals, but by geography. As the road to Budapest begins, the 36 participants are each scheduled to play four away games, with the distances between cities varying wildly. Some teams will barely leave their home region, while others must embark on journeys across continents. Sportingpedia has analysed every away trip for all 36 teams, adding up the total kilometres they will travel during the league phase. The results reveal an extraordinary range, from marathon campaigns spanning Eurasia to a handful of short hops within Western Europe. One of the report’s most curious revelations is that the shortest distance a club will cover for a visit is just 102 kilometres – a journey Union Saint-Gilloise have already made, winning 3-1 away at PSV – while the longest is the 6,904-kilometre trek from Almaty to Lisbon for Kairat’s clash with Sporting.
Champions League 2025/26:
Distance Each Club Must Travel for Away Games
No club faces a more demanding travel schedule than Kairat of Almaty. The Kazakh champions are set to cover 22,388 kilometres in their four away matches – a number that dwarfs every other team in the competition. Their furthest trip, to Sporting Lisbon, covers a staggering 6,904 kilometres each way, making it by far the single longest journey of this season’s league phase. To put this in context, Atalanta, who have the shortest total travel distance of any club, will log just 2,279 kilometres in all four of their away games – less than one-third of Kairat’s Lisbon round-trip alone.
Qarabag of Azerbaijan sit second in the distance rankings with 15,579 kilometres to travel for their four away fixtures, including visits to Liverpool, Lisbon, Naples, and Bilbao. The gap between Qarabag and third-placed Real Madrid, who will travel 10,729 kilometres, is almost as great as that between Real Madrid and many mid-ranking clubs. For Real, the bulk of their mileage comes from a single daunting trip to Almaty, which clocks in at over 6,400 kilometres.
Elsewhere, Pafos of Cyprus (10,335 kilometres) and Bodo/Glimt of Norway (9,947 kilometres) round out the top five, both facing at least one journey over 3,000 kilometres and a consistently punishing travel schedule. Galatasaray, Club Brugge, and Copenhagen also each top 7,700 kilometres, highlighting the disadvantage faced by clubs from Europe’s geographic periphery.
At the other end of the scale, Italian and German clubs generally benefit from proximity to the tournament’s geographical centre. Atalanta’s four away games total just 2,279 kilometres, with their longest single trip – Bergamo to Brussels – measuring under 900 kilometres. Borussia Dortmund, Arsenal, and Inter also keep their travel below 3,500 kilometres.
Three of the shortest individual away journeys this season are all under 200 kilometres: Union Saint-Gilloise’s trip from Brussels to Eindhoven (102 kilometres), PSV’s visit to Leverkusen (116 kilometres), and Monaco’s travel to Turin (150 kilometres). In stark contrast, the three longest single trips all involve Kairat as either the host or the visitor: Almaty to Lisbon (6,904 kilometres), Madrid to Almaty (6,411 kilometres), and Almaty to London (5,598 kilometres).
This huge disparity in travel highlights one of the major logistical challenges of the new Champions League format. For teams like Kairat and Qarabag, the demands extend well beyond the pitch, with their players facing gruelling journeys and tight turnarounds. For clubs based in Western and Central Europe, meanwhile, geography continues to offer a quiet advantage – less time in the air, more time for recovery and preparation.
In summary, the 2025/26 Champions League will not only test the best squads in Europe but will also reward those who can manage the unique demands of the schedule. With distances ranging from over 22,000 kilometres down to barely 2,200, the road to knockout qualification will be longer – and more uneven – than ever before.