A total of 26 teams (teams ranked 28–53 in the CAF entrant list) played home-and-away over two legs. The 13 winners advanced to the second round.
Seeding
The draw for the first round was held as part of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Preliminary Draw on 25 July 2015, starting 18:00 MSK (UTC+3), at the Konstantinovsky Palace in Strelna, Saint Petersburg, Russia.[2][3][4]
The seeding was based on the FIFA World Rankings of July 2015 (shown in parentheses).[5] The 26 teams are seeded into two pots:
Pot 4 contained the teams ranked 1–13 (i.e., 28–40 in the CAF entrant list).
Pot 5 contained the teams ranked 14–26 (i.e., 41–53 in the CAF entrant list).
Each tie contained a team from Pot 4 and a team from Pot 5, with the team from Pot 4 hosting the second leg.
Note: Bolded teams qualified for the second round.
^Somalia played their home leg in Ethiopia due to the Somali Civil War.
^The South Sudan v Mauritania match was suspended after 10 minutes due to torrential rain, with the score 1–1 at the time. The match was resumed on 8 October 2015, 11:00 UTC+3.[6]
^Swaziland v Djibouti were to originally kick off on 13 October 2015, 19:00 UTC+3, but has been postponed to 17 October 2015, due to the inability of Djibouti's national team to arrive on time for the game.[7]
^After the Eritrea-Botswana match, ten Eritrea players refused to return home and sought asylum in Botswana.[8]
