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Objective: To report on the effectiveness of a standardised core Maternity Waiting Home (MWH) model to increase facility deliveries among women living >10 km from a health facility., Design: Quasi-experimental design with partial randomisation at the cluster level., Setting: Seven rural districts in Zambia., Population: Women delivering at 40 health facilities between June 2016 and August 2018., Methods: Twenty intervention and 20 comparison sites were used to test whether MWHs increased facility delivery for women living in rural Zambia. Difference-in-differences (DID) methodology was used to examine the effectiveness of the core MWH model on our identified outcomes., Main Outcome Measures: Differences in the change from baseline to study period in the percentage of women living >10 km from a health facility who: (1) delivered at the health facility, (2) attended a postnatal care (PNC) visit and (3) were referred to a higher-level health facility between intervention and comparison group., Results: We detected a significant difference in the percentage of deliveries at intervention facilities with the core MWH model for all women living >10 km away (DID 4.2%, 95% CI 0.6-7.6, P = 0.03), adolescent women (<18 years) living >10 km away (DID 18.1%, 95% CI 6.3-29.8, P = 0.002) and primigravida women living >10 km away (DID 9.3%, 95% CI 2.4-16.4, P = 0.01) and for women attending the first PNC visit (DID 17.8%, 95% CI 7.7-28, P < 0.001)., Conclusion: The core MWH model was successful in increasing rates of facility delivery for women living >10 km from a healthcare facility, including adolescent women and primigravidas and attendance at the first PNC visit., Tweetable Abstract: A core MWH model increased facility delivery for women living >10 km from a health facility including adolescents and primigravidas in Zambia., (© 2021 The Authors. BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)