The tournament will run for 44 days from the Opening Ceremony in Cape Town on Saturday, February 8, to the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003 Final in Johannesburg on Sunday, March 23.

There will be a total of 54 cricket matches - a record for the ICC Cricket World Cup.
All games will be day games, except in Cape Town and Durban where all games (five at each venue) will be day-night games, the only two centres where day-night games are scheduled.
The 14 teams (see World Cup Squads and Schedule) will play each other in the preliminary or pool section on a round robin basis. There will be 42 matches of these matches played over a period of 24 days.

The top three teams from each pool will proceed to the next stage of the tournament, known as the Super Six, carrying with them the points scored in matches against the other qualifying teams in their pool. The Super Six will be played over a period of nine days during which there will be two days on which no matches will be played and two days on which there will be two matches per day. In the latter case, one match will be a day game and the other a day-night game.

The Super Six will determine the four teams that will contest the semifinals - a day game in Port Elizabeth on Tuesday, March 18, and a day-night game in Durban on Thursday, March 20. In the semifinals, Team 1 plays Team 4 and Team 2 plays Team 3.
Games in South Africa will be staged in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, Port Elizabeth, Centurion, Bloemfontein, Paarl, Potchefstroom, East London, Benoni, Kimberley and Pietermaritzburg. Games in Zimbabwe will be staged at Harare and Bulawayo, three games each. The two games in Kenya will be staged at Nairobi.