With Brazil being the hosts, their team automatically qualified despite their sevens team not regularly appearing in the
World Rugby Sevens Series. The
2014–15 Sevens World Series was the initial stage of qualification, with the top 4 teams at the end of the series gaining qualification to the 2016 Olympic Games. Between June and September 2015, each of the six regional rugby unions held an Olympic qualification event, where one team from each region qualified, bringing the total up to 11 teams qualified. The final spot was determined by a repechage tournament held in
Monaco, where the winner of that event became the final team to qualify for the 2016 Olympic Games. As a result of England finishing fourth in the 2014–15 Sevens World Series,
Great Britain were awarded a spot in the Olympic Games, despite the other nations failing to qualify in the top 4. This is because Great Britain compete as one union in the Olympics and as several in international rugby (
Rugby Football Union for England,
Welsh Rugby Union,
Scottish Rugby Union and the combined
Irish Rugby Football Union for Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland), which meant should one of either the England, Wales or Scotland teams qualify, then Great Britain would be awarded a spot in the Olympic Games. It was decided players based in Northern Ireland were not eligible to represent Great Britain in the rugby sevens tournament as these players represent the IRFU, and the union demanded that Northern Irish players that have committed to play for the Irish rugby union, only play for Ireland despite being eligible under IOC rules to compete for Great Britain. The three remaining unions agreed in advance of the
2013–14 Sevens World Series that their highest-finishing teams in that season would represent all three unions in the first stage of qualification.
Qualified teams ==Squads==