Wayne Pivac’s side were in the top pool of seeds for the global tournament along with defending champions South Africa, England and New Zealand.
And the draw for the 2023 competition has ended with Wales alongside two of the same teams they faced in 2019 in Japan in the Wallabies and Pacific Island side Fiji.
Wales will also face two yet to be decided teams in France (Europe 1 and the qualifier winner).
The 2023 World Cup will the third successive tournament where Wales have faced Australia and Fiji in the pool stages. It will be the fifth straight World Cup with Wales and Fiji in the same pool.
Full 2023 Rugby World Cup draw
The full draw for the 2023 Rugby World Cup
Wales head coach Pivac said: “It’s a similar pool, but in another country. I’m certainly very excited. Fiji have just been in the Autumn Nations Cup and couldn’t play all their matches.
“I certainly have an affinity to Fiji having coached there in 2007. I’m really excited. It does give us a real focal point now and with Dave Rennie at Australia it’s going to be a big challenge.
“We saw Uruguay get a big upset in 2019 and everyone is going to be on their toes for every single match.
“It will be a massive challenge for Alun Wyn Jones to make 2023, but if there is any player that can do it, then Alun Wyn is that guy. He looks after himself and prepares so well.
“He knows the landscape very well and knows what it takes to get into that shape. He’ll be the one to decide that in terms of where his body and mind is at. He loves those sorts of challenges.”
Wales head coach Wayne Pivac
It’s a similar pool, but in another country. I’m certainly very excited
There remains a good chance that the Europe 1 team Wales will face could be Georgia – another side they met in the pool stages of 2019.
Head coach Pivac and his team will look to 2019 for inspiration. Only last year Wales beat both Australia and Fiji to finish top of their World Cup pool.
They went on to finish fourth in the tournament in the Far East.
“There is a lot of experience in terms of players who played against Australia and Fiji in 2019. We also had Stephen Jones who joined the party there and was a part of those matches,” Pivac said.
“We’ll draw on that and his experiences. We’re three years out and there is a lot of work going on in Wales in terms of building depth. We used the Autumn Nations Cup to do that.
“We’re certainly looking forward to rolling our sleeves up and going into the Six Nations which will come up very quickly. There is a lot of work to be done, but building depth is really important for us looking ahead to 2023 and hopefully we’ll be playing our best rugby at that stage.
“We don’t want to get carried away and we’ve got four big pool matches to play.
“If we were to get through then obviously the excitement would go through the roof in Wales for an England match.”
There is a lot of work to be done, but building depth is really important for us looking ahead to 2023 and hopefully we’ll be playing our best rugby at that stage
Elsewhere for the 2023 World Cup, New Zealand, France and Italy are all in Pool A.
South Africa – who beat England in the 2019 final to claim global glory – are in Pool B with two Six Nations sides in Ireland and Scotland.
Eddie Jones’ England are top seeds in Pool D where they will face Japan and Argentina.
