| 1 | Großbritannien | GBR | 43,06 | Q | |
| (Joan Baptiste, Kathy Smallwood-Cook, | |||||
| Beverley Callender, Shirley Thomas) | |||||
| 2 | Bulgarien | BUL | 43,19 | Q | |
| (Ginka Zagorcheva, Anelia Nuneva, | |||||
| Nadezhda Georgieva, Pepa Pavlova) | |||||
| 3 | UdSSR | URS | 43,51 | Q | |
| (Lyudmila Kondratyeva, Yelena Vinogradova, | |||||
| Irina Olkhovnikova, Olga Antonova) | |||||
| 4 | CSSR | TCH | 43,89 | Q | |
| (Jarmila Nygrynova-Strejckova, Stepanka Sokolova, | |||||
| Radislava Soborova, Eva Murková) | |||||
| 5 | BRD | FRG | 44,21 | ||
| (Monika Hirsch, Elke Vollmer, | |||||
| Michaela Schabinger, Ute Thimm) | |||||
| 6 | Italien | ITA | 44,46 | ||
| (Carla Mercurio, Erica Rossi, | |||||
| Daniela Ferrian, Marisa Masullo) | |||||
| 7 | Finnland | FIN | 44,77 | ||
| (Sisko Markkanen-Hanhijoki, Helinä Marjamaa, | |||||
| Margareete Honkaharju, Riitta Ketonen) | |||||
| 8 | Dänemark | DEN | 45,04 | NR | |
| (Britt Hansen, Helle Theil, | |||||
| Lisbet Nissen-Petersen, Dorthe A. Rasmussen) |
| 1 | DDR | GDR | 42,59 | Q | |
| (Silke Gladisch, Marita Koch, | |||||
| Ingrid Auerswald, Marlies Göhr) | |||||
| 2 | Jamaika | JAM | 43,10 | Q | AR |
| (Leleith Hodges, Jacqueline Pusey, | |||||
| Juliet Cuthbert, Merlene Ottey) | |||||
| 3 | Frankreich | FRA | 43,52 | Q | |
| (Marie-France Loval, Marie-Christine Cazier-Ballo, | |||||
| Rose-Aimée Bacoul, Liliane Gaschet) | |||||
| 4 | Kanada | CAN | 44,19 | Q | |
| (Angela Bailey, Marita Payne-Wiggins, | |||||
| Tanya Brothers, Molly Killingbeck) | |||||
| 5 | USA | USA | 44,20 | ||
| (Alice Brown, Diane Williams, | |||||
| Chandra Cheeseborough, Randy Givens) | |||||
| 6 | Bahamas | BAH | 44,76 | NR | |
| (Shonel Ferguson, Pauline Davis-Thompson, | |||||
| Whelma Colebrook, Oralee Fowler) | |||||
| 7 | Ghana | GHA | 47,51 | ||
| (Grace Armah, Mercy Addy, | |||||
| Elisabeth Wilson, Mary Mensah) |