Bear Digest

How Chicago Bears' division crown impacts their 2026 schedule

The division winner gets the tougher schedule and here's who the Bears will play next year, but one never knows who improves and drops in this NFL on a year-to-year basis.
Gene Chamberlain|
Caleb Williams and the Bears will face the Eagles again in 2026, as a result of both finishing first in their divisions.
Caleb Williams and the Bears will face the Eagles again in 2026, as a result of both finishing first in their divisions. | Eric Hartline-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

With the Bears' NFC North crown comes at least one home playoff game.

It also theoretically carries along a more difficult schedule for the 2026 season.

On paper it would look this way, with the Bears playing games against divisional champions instead of last-place finishers in their divisions the way they did this season.

In home games for 2026, the Bears face their three divisional opponents as well as the Saints, Buccaneers, Patriots, Jets and Eagles.

They also have a home game against either the Texans or Jaguars. They host whichever one emerges with the AFC South crown.

Both have 11 wins. The Jaguars have a game at Indianapolis and a home game with Tennessee left while the Texans finish at home against the Colts. In case of a tie. The Texans currently own the tiebreaker, with a better record against common opponents thanks to a win over Denver.

In road games, the Bears play their NFC North rivals plus the Falcons, Panthers, Bills, Dolphins and whoever emerges from the three-team NFC West battle with the division title between the Seahawks, Rams and 49ers. The Bears obviously will have a big say in this themselves with the Sunday night game against San Francisco.

It appears a far more difficult schedule than this season, but often tougher schedules before the season turn out to be easier and vice versa.

Things happen in a league with a system supposedly based on parity.

A team with Jacksonville or Carolina on its schedule for this season might have anticipated walkovers or at least easier games, but both teams could wind up as division winners like the Bears. A team with Kansas City on its schedule wouldn't have expected a 6-10 opponent.

The Bears are examples of this and also of how schedules don't always line up. Injuries and other factors can come into play.

Even with a last-place finish last year, the Bears somehow had a schedule tied for second toughest prior to the start of this season based on teams' records in 2024. Their opponents had a .571 winning percentage, same as Detroit's schedule after the Lions won the division title.

The Bears also played 10 2024 playoff opponents. The tops for any team was 11. This happened because three NFC North teams made the playoffs last year.

However, the way it actually all played out was the Bears had the third-easiest schedule based on records for this year's opponents. Their opponents for this season own a .423 winning percentage .

Only New England (.394) and Denver (.409) played easier schedules based on opponents' winning percentage.

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.