More than 500 gymnasts from 76 nations will converge on the Aspire Dome for an event where, for the first time, Olympic places are on offer along with 42 World Championship medals.

Olympic champions Simone Biles of the United States and Kohei Uchimura of Japan, who were absent from the all-around finals at the 2017 World Championships in Montreal, are back this year.

Also sharing the limelight will be new world champions Morgan Hurd of the United States and China's Xiao Ruoteng.

Biles - who took a year off after winning four Olympic golds at Rio 2016 but looked formidable in training at the Aspire Dome earlier this week - is tipped to become the first female gymnast to win four world all-around titles, while six-time world champion Uchimura will be competing in four events only.

The line-up in Doha includes 22 world and Olympic gold medallists from 13 nations.

All but one of the Olympic apparatus champions will be in the Qatari capital, and all but three of the reigning world apparatus champions will be back to defend their titles.

These are the 48th World Championships - and the first to be staged in the Middle East - and Watanabe has applauded the efforts of the Qatar Gymnastics Federation (QGF).

Until 2018, the hosting of this competition had been limited to Europe, North America, Australia and East Asia, yet Doha is a familiar destination for many of the participants as it has staged a FIG World Cup each year since 2008, as well as the 2006 Asian Games.

The FIG President said: "I came to Qatar for the first time for the Asian Games in 2006.

"At that time, gymnastics was nothing more than flower seeds.

"In just 12 years since, Qatar has made the desert bloom with the flower of the World Championships.

"A dream is not something we have while we're sleeping - a dream is something we realise.

"I offer my thanks to the Qatar Gymnastics Federation for showing their great courage and I hope the gymnasts will respond with some wonderful performances, watering the flowers that the federation has brought into blossom."

Starting tomorrow and concluding on November 3, the World Championships will provide the first qualification route for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

The competition will determine the winners of eight sets of medals for men - team, all-around, floor exercise, pommel horse, rings, vault, parallel bars and horizontal bar.

There will be six for women - team, all-around, vault, uneven bars, balance beam and floor.

The three medal-winning nations in the team finals for both men and women will earn berths directly Tokyo 2020 and other nations will have further chances to qualify at the 2019 and 2020 finals.

The Japanese men and American women are the reigning Olympic champions from Rio and defending world champions from the 2015 World Championships in Glasgow.

The team competition is not held at the World Championships in post-Olympic years.

"We are thrilled and honoured to provide the world's best gymnasts with the eager global media presence, optimal venue conditions and enthusiastic spectator support to make their important first strides towards the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo," said Ali Al Hitmi, chief executive of the Local Organising Committee and President of the QGF.

"We are confident that, as the competitors in Doha challenge for world titles and Olympic berths, they will inspire fans and continue to propel the sport upward."