The tournament has 5 stages. The first four stages are played as mini-league round-robin tournaments, except for third stage in region IV, which is played as a knockout stage. The final stage features two knockout rounds and a final four-team group stage to determine the two promoted teams.
This year 27 teams qualified for the Etapa Regional (Regional Stage): 1 team relegated last year from First Division and 26 champions from each department (including 2 from Lima (the capital) - Peru is politically divided in 24 Departments and 1 Constitutional Province).
All these teams are divided into 8 groups by geographical proximity; then each winner qualifies for the Etapa Nacional (National Stage).
Those 8 teams will play, again by geographical proximity, home and away matches, in a knock-out tournament. The winner of the final will be promoted to the First Division.
Departmental Stage
The following list shows the teams that qualified for the Regional Stage.