Capacity: 34,250
Opened: March 2001
Home team: FC Basel
Basel trivia: In 1938, the chemist Albert Hofmann discovered LSD in the city.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group A: Switzerland vs Norway, 2 July, 8pm (all times BST)
-
Group C: Germany vs Denmark, 8 July, 5pm
-
Group D: Netherlands vs France, 13 July, 8pm
-
Quarter-final: Winner Group D vs Runner-up Group C, 19 July, 8pm
-
Final: 27 July, 5pm
It sits on the site of the Stadion St Jakob (playfully nicknamed Joggeli as a Swiss diminutive of Jakob), which hosted six matches at the men’s 1954 World Cup and closed in 1998. St Jakob-Park opened in 2001 and hosted six matches at Euro 2008 (although a torrential downpour during that tournament led to the pitch having to be completely relaid overnight) and also has an in-built shopping mall and even a retirement home with a lounge that has full views of the pitch.
If you can’t get a ticket for the final at Joggeli on 27 July, Basel, the most northerly host city in Switzerland, is still well worth a visit. Join the locals in stashing valuables in a floating Wickelfisch swim bag (invented in Basel) and float down the Rhine. It’s free, fun and a unique way to see the picturesque Old Town. A good place to enter the river is just by Museum Tinguely before a 3km bob on the current down to the Rheinbad Breite and St Johann bathing houses.
Capacity: 29,800
Opened: July 2005
Home team: Young Boys
Berne trivia: Albert Einstein worked out his theory of relativity while living there, while he was employed as a patent examiner at the patent office.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group B: Spain vs Portugal, 3 July, 8pm
-
Group A: Switzerland vs Iceland, 6 July, 8pm
-
Group B: Italy vs Spain, 11 July, 8pm
-
Quarter-final: Winner Group B vs Runner-up Group A, 18 July, 8pm
Originally branded as Stade de Suisse when it was built in 2005, it was renamed in 2020 in an attempt to return to the stadium’s roots. The old stadium hosted the men’s 1954 World Cup final, “the Miracle of Berne”, in which West Germany came back from 2-0 down to win 3-2, ending a 31-match unbeaten run for the Mighty Magyars, the legendary Hungary team led by Ferenc Puskás.
The British band Muse said the stadium’s name inspired the Wankdorf Jam, a popular instrumental used in their live shows. The ground has solar panels on its roof which produce a yearly yield of 1.2 million kWh (or 1.20 gigawatts). For reference, that’s enough to fully charge more than 10,000 electric cars and is only just shy of the 1.21 gigawatts Doc Brown claims is needed to activate the flux capacitor for his DeLorean time machine in Back to the Future.
Capacity: 29,800
Opened: April 2003
Home team: Servette
Geneva trivia: Most of the drinking water (80%) in the city is extracted from the lake and no electricity is used from nuclear reactors or fossil fuels.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group C: Denmark v Sweden, 4 July, 5pm
-
Group B: Portugal vs Italy, 7 July, 8pm
-
Group A: Finland vs Switzerland, 10 July, 8pm
-
Quarter-final: Winner Group A vs Runner-up Group B, 16 July, 8pm
-
Semi-final: Winner QF3 vs Winner QF1, 22 July, 8pm
Unusually, the Stade de Genève’s sole owner is not a club, or a obscure billionaire, but a private foundation, acting alongside support from the state of Geneva. The Fondation du Stade de Genève acted as the project manager for the stadium’s construction and inauguration in 2003 and runs the stadium to this day. “Above all, it is a stadium of the Genevans,” claims the foundation, which means anyone can hire it, from a conference room to a “VIP corridor” to the entire pitch, assuming you are willing to pay enough Swiss francs.
The Stade de Genève’s finest game is probably the men’s Euro 2008 clash between Czech Republic and Turkey, in which the latter came back from 2-0 down to triumph 3-2 in the closing stages, aided by an uncharacteristic goalkeeping howler from Petr Cech in the Czech goal, spilling an easy cross to allow Nihat Kahveci to score an equaliser in the 87th minute. Nihat scored the winner for Turkey two minutes later, racing through on goal and curling a fine shot off the underside of the bar.
Capacity: 22,700
Opened: August 2007
Home team: FC Zürich, Grasshopper
Zurich trivia: As well as having a reputation for banking and watches, the city hosts Street Parade, the largest techno party in the world, often attracting more than a million attendees.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures
-
Group C: Denmark v Sweden, 4 July, 5pm
-
Group B: Portugal vs Italy, 7 July, 8pm
-
Group A: Finland vs Switzerland, 10 July, 8pm
-
Quarter-final: Winner Group A vs Runner-up Group B, 16 July, 8pm
-
Semi-final: Winner QF3 vs Winner QF1, 22 July, 8pm
Not only is Stadion Letzigrund home to the men and women’s sides for two clubs, FC Zürich and Grasshopper, but it also hosts concerts (Metallica and Ed Sheeran are scheduled to play there in the next year) and elite athletics meets, with a running track surrounding the pitch. The distance between the stands and the pitch may not be popular with football fans but this place has serious athletic pedigree: on 21 June 1960, the German sprinter Armin Hary became the first human to run the 100m in 10 seconds flat. The judges were apparently so shocked, they said it must have been a false start, but Hary repeated the feat 35 minutes after his first record-breaking run.
Arguably Zurich’s most notable footballing structure is not Stadion Letzigrund but the nearby Fifa global headquarters, a zero-emission building which is mostly underground, with the meeting room for the executive committee hermetically sealed. “Places where people make decisions should only contain indirect light,” said Sepp Blatter after the building’s competition in 2006, “because the light should come from the people themselves who are assembled there.” Sure.
Capacity: 16,300
Opened: July 2008
Home team: St Gallen
St Gallen trivia: Once the embroidery capital of the world, the first embroidery machines were invented in the city in the early 1900s.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group C: Germany vs Poland, 4 July, 8pm
-
Group D: France vs Wales, 9 July, 8pm
-
Group D: England vs Wales, 13 July, 8pm
Arena St Gallen (or Kybunpark as it is normally known) replaced St Gallen’s old ground, the Espenmoos Stadion, in 2008. The new stadium is unfortunately a few miles out of town, wedged in a retail park between an Ikea and a Decathlon. There is even a shopping mall underneath the stadium. If that all sounds a bit dystopian and an example of modern football eating itself, FC St Gallen are actually the second oldest football team in continental Europe (after the Danish side Kjøbenhavns Boldklub, founded 1876, who are now known as FC Copenhagen). Despite St Gallen’s rich history, the men’s side have only won the Swiss top flight on two occasions – in 1904 and 2000 – while the women’s side, founded in 2017, are yet to win anything.
If you are a meat eater, try the local delicacy, the St Gallen bratwurst. Dating back to the middle ages, it’s a veal sausage cooked with bacon, spices and fresh milk, with each butcher and eatery in St Gallen guarding their own secret recipe. Metzgerei Gemperli, a restaurant on Schmiedgasse, is said to be one of the best places to find it.
Capacity: 14,350
Opened: 1934
Home team: Luzern
Lucerne trivia: The Chapel Bridge, built in 1333, is the oldest covered bridge in Europe and is 204m (669 ft) long, although much of it had to be replaced after a fire in 1993, widely thought to be caused by a discarded cigarette.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
Group D: Wales vs Netherlands, 5 July, 5pm
Group C: Poland vs Sweden, 8 July, 8pm
Group C: Poland vs Denmark, 12 July, 8pm
Normally known as the Swissporarena for sponsorship reasons, this stadium has adopted the name of the old ground that was demolished in 2009: Allmend Stadion. It’s a beautiful spot, overlooked by the huge Mount Pilatus in the Swiss Alps, even if the ground itself is a bit forgettable, although the Welsh and Dutch will surely get stuck in for their tournament opener here on 5 July.
The official language is German but most locals speak an Alemannic Swiss-German dialect that is specific to the city: Lucerne German. The city is twinned with Bournemouth in England and Chicago in the US.
Capacity: 7,750
Opened: August 1968
Home team: Sion
Sion trivia: One of the most important prehistoric sites in Europe, the Alpine town’s oldest trace of human settlement comes from 6200BC during the late Mesolithic period.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group B: Belgium vs Italy, 3 July, 5pm
-
Group A: Norway vs Finland, 6 July, 5pm
-
Group B: Portugal vs Belgium 11 July, 8pm
The Stade de Tourbillon is the smallest of the tournament stadiums with fewer than 8,000 seats, but is one of the few grounds that has not been rebuilt or redeveloped this century, most recently getting a makeover in 1989. Remarkably, given its size, Sion does occasionally host the men’s Swiss national side, most recently for a Euro 2020 qualifier against Gibraltar.
Sion is a small town, and the second most southerly of the host cities (after Geneva). At the last count in 2020 it was home to just 35,000 people, so roughly half the size of Loughborough. One might not expect a cosy place beside a placid Alpine lake to have a surfing wave pool but Alaia Bay in Sion was reportedly the first open to the public in mainland Europe.
Capacity: 8,100
Opened: July 2011
Home team: Thun
Thun trivia: Switzerland is famously neutral, but Thun has one of the biggest army bases in the country and the largest Swiss military barracks.
Women’s Euros 2025 fixtures:
-
Group A: Iceland vs Finland, 2 July, 5pm
-
Group B: Spain vs Belgium, 7 July, 5pm
-
Group A: Norway vs Iceland, 10 July, 8pm
One of the few stadiums on this list to have artificial grass, the elite footballers at Euro 2025 will be wary of knee injuries, particularly on a dry, slow surface that is traditionally designed to protect against the wetter and colder winter Alpine elements. FC Thun’s previous stadium, Stadion Lachen, was right on the lake but used to flood, so Arena Thun (or Stockhorn Arena as it is normally known) was built inland and opened in 2011.
The town itself is considered one of the most beautiful in Switzerland, with dozens of bridges that link over the Aare as it feeds into Lake Thun. The idyllic Schadaupark is built in the style of an English garden, there is a large castle that looms over the town, while the nearby St Beatus Caves, carved into the mountainside, were created – legend has it – by the wandering Irish monk Beatus, who drove away a a mischievous dragon 1,900 years ago.