A total of twelve teams (teams ranked 35–46 in the AFC entrant list) played home-and-away over two legs. The six winners advanced to the second round.
The six losers were eligible to enter the 2020 AFC Solidarity Cup, which was subsequently cancelled.
Timor-Leste were barred from participating in the qualification tournament after being found to have fielded a total of twelve ineligible players in 2019 AFC Asian Cup qualification matches, among other competitions.[2] However, as FIFA did not bar Timor-Leste from the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, they were still allowed to enter the competition, but were ineligible to qualify for the Asian Cup.[3]
Seeding
The draw for the first round was held on 17 April 2019 at 11:00 MST (UTC+8), at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.[4]
The seeding was based on the FIFA World Rankings of April 2019 (shown in parentheses below).[5] Teams from Pot A hosted the first leg, while teams from Pot B hosted the second leg.
Note: Bolded teams qualified for the second round.
^ abThe match was awarded as a 3–0 victory to Sri Lanka,[6] after Macau did not send their team for the match due to safety reasons following the 2019 Sri Lanka Easter bombings.[7]