Development The conception of this tournament came on 11 September 2007 during a CAF Executive Committee in
Johannesburg,
South Africa, with the aim being to give homegrown players opportunities to represent their nations and promote their home leagues globally. The tournament was approved and confirmed in January 2008 before
that year's Africa Cup of Nations in Ghana. Following its conclusion of that tournament in February, CAF voted unanimously for Ivory Coast against firm-favorite countries like Sudan and Egypt to host the inaugural edition, after which the tournament dates and schedules were confirmed.
Inauguration and commencement Qualification for the inaugural edition began on 29 March and concluded on 14 December 2008, which ended with seven teams joining
Ivory Coast at the inaugural edition. The inaugural tournament match kicked off between
Zambia and Ivory Coast on 22 February 2009 at the
Felix Houphouet Boigny Stadium in
Abidjan with Zambian
Given Singuluma scoring the tournament's first goal. In Group A, Zambia and Senegal qualified at the expense of
Tanzania and Ivory Coast. In Group B,
Ghana and DR Congo qualified for the knockout stages with
Zimbabwe and Libya eliminated. In the semi-finals, Ghana defeated Senegal
on penalties whereas DR Congo beat Zambia to advance to the final. Zambia nonetheless finished their inaugural CHAN campaign on a high after defeating Senegal in the third-place match. DR Congo defeated Ghana 2–0 in the final at the same stadium that opened the tournament to became the inaugural champions, thus in the process ending a 35-year wait for an international trophy win of any sort.
Tournament expansion The rapid interest of African countries in the tournament led to an increase in team participation from 8 to 16 in its second edition hosted by Sudan amid a struggle for
the independence for the southern part of the country in 2011. It was hosted in four cities;
Omdurman,
Khartoum,
Wad Madani and
Port Sudan. Qualification for that edition began on 11 January and concluded on 6 June 2010, with 11 teams making their tournament debuts and 5 teams, including Ghana and Libya, returned for the second edition. The 2011 edition was seen by the media as "very irregular", as there was a dominant team in each group but all the second teams were decided in the third and final group stage round.
Cameroon and
South Africa won all their group stage matches, but ended up losing to
Angola and
Algeria respectively in the quarter-finals. Meanwhile, Sudan beat
Niger on penalties and
Tunisia beat then-defending champions DR Congo. In the semi-finals on 22 February 2011, Tunisia v Algeria and Sudan v Angola finished 1–1 after the regulation 120 minutes, with Tunisia beating Algeria 3–5 on penalties and Angola winning 4–2 against Sudan also on penalties. The second tournament editions hosts Sudan thus finished their campaign off on a high with third place and bronze medals after beating Algeria 1–0. Tunisia and Angola got a rematch in the final after a group stage 1–1 drawn match, with the former
claiming the title on its debut with a 3–0 win over Angola.
FIFA recognition , one of the
2010 FIFA World Cup stadiums, home of
the 2014 final. CAF changed the frequency of the Africa Cup of Nations following
the 2010 edition to odd-numbered years so as not to clash with the
FIFA World Cup, which had a consequential knock-on effect on CHAN, which was from then on held biennially in even-numbered years. CAF also named Libya as hosts of
the 2013 AFCON and
the 2014 CHAN, but had both hosting rights stripped at the onset of
the first Libyan civil war. Several countries offered themselves as replacement hosts, including Egypt and South Africa, with the latter chosen as the hosts, citing the credential of its impressive infrastructural hosting of the
2010 FIFA World Cup. The third edition ran from 11 January to 1 February 2014 and was labelled by the media as "fantastic", as they claimed the host nation's stadiums which hosted World Cup matches 4 years earlier "gave a different touch to the tournament". Like the second edition, the quarter-finalists were decided in the third and final round, with decisive goals in added-on time in each group and the knockout stages except the final were decided by the odd goal or on penalties. In the match for third place,
Nigeria, who had several players on their team who won
the final of the previous year's AFCON and were preparing for the
2014 FIFA World Cup, won the bronze medal, after beating Zimbabwe 1–0. The
final was held in
Cape Town between Ghana and then-surprise package Libya. The match, like that entire edition, was very tight and ended 0–0 and the champions were determined by penalties. After 6 penalties per side, Libya won their inaugural CHAN title and their first continental title in its history, which at the time was more than impressive given than they won a single match in the group stage against
Ethiopia and went undefeated through consecutive draws and penalty shoot-out wins.
Moroccan and Congolese domination welcomed at
N'djili Airport after winning
the 2016 edition. vs
DR Congo at the quarter-finals of
the 2020 edition.
The 4th edition of the tournament was held from 16 January to 7 February 2016 in Rwanda and DR Congo claimed their second title defeating
Mali, in the final for the first time and thus representing their best tournament performance, 3–0 in
the final.
The 5th edition in 2018 was originally scheduled to be hosted in Kenya, but due to several delays in preparation and organisation, CAF stripped the country of the hosting rights and opened a new election process. On 14 October 2017, CAF announced Morocco as the new host of the 2018 edition, which was played between 13 January to 4 February. One of the main reasons why Morocco applied to be an organiser is because
it was looking to host the
2026 FIFA World Cup, so the tournament represented one of the country's last chances to show itself as a strong candidate.
The final pitted hosts Morocco and
Nigeria; both teams were undefeated throughout that edition of the tournament and only had a draw to their credit in their respective group stages. Morocco won the match 4–0, winning the title for the first time and becoming the first host nation to win the tournament. Morocco successfully defended their title in the
2020 edition, postponed to 2021 due to the
COVID-19 pandemic in Africa and
its impact, by defeating Mali 2–0
in the final on 7 February 2021, thus becoming the first and so far only nation to win back-to-back titles. On 4 February 2023, Senegal defeated Algeria in the penalty shootout to become the first West African nation to win the title, which followed on from
their win in the
2021 Africa Cup of Nations. The
seventh edition was played in Algeria from 13 January to 4 February 2023. Eighteen teams were supposed to be contesting in this edition, which would have been an increase of 2 teams from the previous edition in 2020; but defending champions
Morocco were unable to defend their title due to political tensions with Algerian authorities which began with Algeria's unilaterally decision in 2021 to close its airspace to Moroccan flights, including and especially its official carrier
Royal Air Maroc.
Senegal won their first title after defeating
Algeria in
the final 5–4 on penalties after the match ended 0–0. Senegal became the first team to win the Africa Cup of Nations and the African Nations Championship back-to-back. Morocco won their record third title in the
2024 edition, held in
Kenya,
Uganda, and
Tanzania, defeating
Madagascar 3–2 in the final. On 20 December 2025, CAF President Dr Motsepe announced the cancellation of the African Nations Championship during a press conference, with the
African Nations League introduced as its replacement. ==Sponsorship==