| 1 | USA | USA | 3:24,92 | Q | |
| (Rochelle Stevens, Diane Dixon, | |||||
| Natasha Kaiser-Brown, Lillie Leatherwood) | |||||
| 2 | Deutschland | GER | 3:25,93 | Q | |
| (Uta Rohländer, Annet Hesselbarth, | |||||
| Christine Wachtel, Kathrin Schreiter) | |||||
| 3 | Kanada | CAN | 3:27,15 | Q | |
| (Rosey Edeh, Karen Clarke, | |||||
| Cheryl Allen, Charmaine Crooks) | |||||
| 4 | Ungarn | HUN | 3:28,38 | q | |
| (Edit Molnar, Agnes Kozary, | |||||
| Noemi Batori, Judit Forgacs) | |||||
| 5 | Schweiz | SUI | 3:30,32 | ||
| (Kathrin Luthi, Regula Zürcher-Scalabrin, | |||||
| Martha Grossenbacher, Anita Protti) | |||||
| 6 | Norwegen | NOR | 3:32,76 | NR | |
| (Trine Rugsveen, Lisbeth Pettersen, | |||||
| Mona Karin Riisnes, Sølvi Olsen-Meinseth) |
| 1 | UdSSR | URS | 3:23,38 | Q | |
| (Anna Chuprina-Knoroz, Lyudmila Dzhigalova, | |||||
| Tatyana Alekseyeva, Olga Nazarova) | |||||
| 2 | Großbritannien | GBR | 3:23,89 | Q | NR |
| (Phylis Smith, Lorraine Hanson, | |||||
| Linda Keough, Sally Gunnell) | |||||
| 3 | Nigeria | NGR | 3:26,29 | Q | |
| (Charity Opara, Airat Bakare, | |||||
| Omotayo Akinremi, Fatima Yusuf) | |||||
| 4 | Spanien | ESP | 3:29,12 | q | NR |
| (Blanca Lacambra, Julia Merino, | |||||
| Esther Lahoz, Sandra Myers) | |||||
| 5 | Kuba | CUB | 3:31,43 | ||
| (Lency Montelier, Odalmis Limonta, | |||||
| Nancy McLeon, Ana Fidelia Quirot) | |||||
| 6 | Japan | JPN | 3:35,82 | NR | |
| (Yumiko Tokuda, Masayo Kitagawa, | |||||
| Ryoko Sato, Keiko Amano) | |||||
| 7 | Indien | IND | 3:38,54 | ||
| (Ashwini Nachappa, Alphonsa Rayen, | |||||
| Sylvina Cecil Pais, Saramma Kutty) |