The European Team Championships address all European countries who are invited to participate with their representative (national) team.

The format of the championships is a round-robin, whereby each participating team meets every other team in a head-to-head match. There are no qualifying and final stages; at the end of the round-robin, the team with most points is the tournament winner, and the country it represents is crowned 'European Champion' for the particular year.

The European Team Championships were the first international competition to be established in Europe. It was launched in 1932 in Scheveningen, The Netherlands, and was conducted under the auspices of the International Bridge League (IBL), the forerunner of the World Bridge Federation. The IBF organized all prewar European championships. The competition ceased during the war, and was re-established in 1948, under the European Bridge League (EBL) which had replaced IBL in the mean time. All European championships ever since have been conducted by the EBL.

Originally established as an annual event played in one series only (open, i.e. allowing teams of any composition), the European Team Championships had a women series added in 1935. To support the World Team Olympiad, in 1960 it was decided not to hold European Team Championships in the leap years. In 1975, the competition became biennial, held every odd-numbered year. Later on (1995), a senior series was introduced, for players of 55 years or older. Finally, the European Team Championship was moved to even-numbered years as from 2002, to make room for the new competition, the European Open Championships.

The European Team Championships also act as the qualifier for the World (Zonal) Team Championships (Bermuda Bowl and Venice Cup), whereby the top teams in the open and women series qualify to represent Europe in the interzonal team competition.