The America's Cup: how it works and what is next.

How the Cup works

The America's Cup is a match race: one defender against one challenger. The defender is the club that holds the Cup. Clubs that want to race for it compete first in a challenger series, the Louis Vuitton Cup, and the winner goes on to the America's Cup Match. The event's own history traces the Louis Vuitton Cup to 1983.

The trophy was first offered in 1851 as the Hundred Guinea Cup (Britannica and History.com; the Royal Yacht Squadron calls it the "£100 Cup"), for a race around the Isle of Wight, and was won by the New York schooner America (Britannica). The event's history describes the prize as a Royal Yacht Squadron cup that the winning syndicate later gave to the New York Yacht Club under a Deed of Gift, as a perpetual challenge cup for friendly competition between nations. For the full story see America's Cup history.

Winners since 1983

The event's history page says the New York Yacht Club held the Cup for 132 years and that American boats defended it successfully 24 times between 1870 and 1980. Sources do not all agree on that count. History.com and Wikipedia also give 24 defences over 132 years, but the official AC38 press kit (version 3.1, October 2025) gives 24 defences in one section and 25 in another, and 132 years in one place and 134 in another. See America's Cup history. In 1983 Australia II became the first challenger to win, taking the seventh race of a series tied 3-3. Later winners, as listed by the event:

The 1983 to 2021 rows come from the event's own history page; the 2024 row is covered below. The event's list is not a full record of every Match. It leaves out the 1987 and 1988 wins by the San Diego Yacht Club's Stars & Stripes (Herreshoff Marine Museum), America³'s 1992 win and the successful defences by Team New Zealand in 2000 and Alinghi in 2007 (Wikipedia). Those editions are covered on America's Cup history.

The 37th America's Cup: Barcelona, 2024

INEOS Britannia beat Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli 7-4 in the Louis Vuitton Cup final on 4 October 2024. The Royal Yacht Squadron says this made INEOS Britannia the first British team to win an America's Cup challenger series, and the first British team in the Match for 60 years. In the Match itself, in October 2024, Emirates Team New Zealand beat INEOS Britannia 7-2 to keep the Cup.

The 38th America's Cup: Naples, 2027

The Louis Vuitton 38th America's Cup will be held in Naples, the first edition in Italy. Dates were announced in Naples on 21 January 2026: the Match is set to start with two races on Saturday 10 July 2027 and to finish on the weekend of 17 and 18 July 2027.

Defender

Emirates Team New Zealand, for the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron.

Challenger of Record

Royal Yacht Squadron Racing Ltd. Its team, previously known as Athena Racing, took the name GB1 in January 2026.

Boats

AC75s for the Cup itself. The one-design AC40 is used for the preliminary regattas and for the Women's and Youth events.

Team bases

Being set up in Bagnoli, per Reuters in September 2026.

What the Protocol changed

The Protocol, the rulebook for each edition, was released in August 2025. Its main points as reported:

• Each AC75 races with five crew, at least one of whom must be female, and crew nationality rules apply.
• Each boat also carries a "Guest Racer" who is not a member of the team.
• An America's Cup Partnership gives the participating teams equal governance and runs the event's format and commercial rights.
• A cost cap applies, and the stated aim is for the Cup to become a two-yearly event.
• In the Louis Vuitton Cup, the semi-final is first to 5 wins and the final is first to 7.

Sources disagree on crew size. The August 2025 Protocol coverage and a September 2025 report say five crew; Wikipedia (secondary) cites six, from a May 2025 draft. Five is the later figure and comes from the Protocol coverage.

Teams

As of January 2026, five teams were listed: Emirates Team New Zealand, GB1 (Great Britain), Luna Rossa (Italy), Tudor Team Alinghi (Switzerland) and K-Challenge (France).

Two later entries are reported. Wikipedia lists an American Racing Challenger, Team USA, for Sail Newport (confirmed 9 April 2026, with Ken Read as CEO and Giles Scott as skipper) and a Team Australian Challenge for the Royal Prince Edward Yacht Club (announced 14 May 2026, with Tom Slingsby as skipper). Those details rest on Wikipedia only and we could not confirm them from the event. Reuters separately reports that Australia entered late in May 2026 but did not field a crew at the Naples preliminary regatta, and that a United States team did race there.

Preliminary regattas, 2026

Teams from Italy, New Zealand, Britain, France, Switzerland and the United States raced in Naples. Preliminary regatta results do not count toward the Cup itself.

Still to be decided, as of October 2026

• Dates for the 2027 Louis Vuitton Cup had not been published in any source we found.
• Whether another preliminary regatta will be held in early 2027 had not been confirmed by a primary source.
• The final list of challengers had not been confirmed from the event's own site.