SI:AM | What to Know About the NFL Schedule

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I’m pulling for the Pistons and Timberwolves tonight so that I’ll have two Game 7’s to write about on Monday.

In today’s SI:AM: 📅 Full 2026 NFL schedule 🤔 How the schedule was made 😋 11 best games

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Week 1 is 17 weeks away

The NFL schedule is finally here: 272 games in a span of 18 weeks stretching from Sept. 9 to Jan. 10. (You can see every team’s schedule here.)

The schedule hype is always way overblown because you know every game each team will play as soon as the previous season is over. The NFL just likes to make a big deal out of revealing when those games will be played. To that end, here are the most notable bits about when games have been scheduled.

The opener

The season will begin on a Wednesday this year, and the reason why is fairly interesting. Federal law prohibits the NFL from televising games on Fridays and Saturdays between the second Friday in September and the second Saturday in December. That means that to accommodate both the traditional season opener with the defending Super Bowl champion and the recent trend of a stand-alone Week 1 international game (49ers-Rams in Australia, in this case), the league had to put the first game of the season on the Wednesday of that week and the second on the Thursday. (In each of the past two seasons, the opener was on Thursday and there was a game in Brazil on the following day.)

That opening game is a good one, too. It’ll be a Super Bowl rematch between the Seahawks and Patriots.

A record number of international games

The NFL’s quest for world domination takes a step forward this year with an increased number of games played abroad. The 2026 season will feature nine games played on foreign soil, the most in league history. Three games will be played in London, along with one each in Paris, Madrid, Munich, Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City and Melbourne.

For the fourth year in a row, the league has chosen to have a team play back-to-back games abroad. Last year, the Vikings played in Dublin in Week 4 and London the following Week. This year, the Jaguars are playing back-to-back games in London in Weeks 5 and 6, the third time in four years that they’ve had a two-week UK residency.

(For more on the NFL’s increasing interest in international markets, check out my story from last year before the Vikings-Steelers game in Dublin.)

The teams no one wants to see

The schedule can also tell you a lot about which teams the NFL expects will stink this year.

The Cardinals, Dolphins, Jets, Raiders and Titans will not play any games in prime time this season. If you want to watch them duke it out for next year’s No. 1 draft pick, you’ll have to tune in on Sunday afternoon on broadcast television, like back in the old days.

This is actually the second year in a row in which the Titans will not be featured on national television. They were one of three teams that didn’t play in prime time last year, along with the Browns and Saints. Those three teams had a combined record of 14–37.

The teams everyone wants to see

By contrast, fans of the Bills and Rams better get used to staying up late. Buffalo and Los Angeles will each play seven games in prime time, the most of any team in the league. Buffalo’s schedule also includes an eighth stand-alone game on Christmas Day (4:30 p.m. ET on Netflix).

The Chiefs, Cowboys, Packers and Seahawks will all play six prime-time games.

The decline of the NFL Sunday

My colleague Jimmy Traina has written a bunch about how the NFL’s quest for increasingly large broadcast revenues has diluted the viewing experience of a wall-to-wall Sunday of games. It’s a good point, and the best example of why Jimmy is right is this year’s Week 16 slate.

The NFL will play one game on Christmas Eve (a Thursday), three on Christmas Day and two on that Saturday. There’s also a Monday Night Football game, of course. That leaves just nine games on Sunday, spread across the 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. ET broadcast windows.

Nine games is a lot of football, but it pales in comparison to the average Sunday, when typically there are 12 or 13 games (depending on how many teams are on a bye). There are a lot of ways people consume football. It’s not just sitting down and watching a full game with your favorite team, or tuning in for the prime-time games. Fans want a packed Sunday schedule so they can flip between games on Sunday Ticket or watch Scott Hanson juggle a million things at once on RedZone. I don’t subscribe to either service, so my preferred method is to watch my team (the Giants) and check social media during breaks in the action for highlights and updates from other games. (If the Giants aren’t playing, I’ll watch whichever channel here in the New York area isn’t showing the Jets.) No matter which experience you choose, it’s diminished when the NFL spreads the action out over the entire week.

The best of Sports Illustrated

Rory McIlroy reacts to a shot at the PGA Championship — It was a rough first round for Rory McIlroy at the PGA Championship. | Bill Streicher-Imagn Images

Albert Breer got the inside scoop on how the schedule was made from NFL EVP of media distribution Hans Schroeder.
As he does every year, Conor Orr picked the best games of the NFL season. The Cardinals might not have any games in prime time, but Orr put one of their games on his list.
Mike Kadlick, Eva Geitheim and Karl Rasmussen picked their winners and losers from the schedule release.
Tyler Lauletta spent yesterday following Rory McIlroy’s group at the PGA Championship and wrote a fun story about what he learned.
Thursday’s round was a reminder of how far three former golf stars have fallen, Michael Rosenberg writes.
Patrick Reed was the only player to have a bogey-free first round at the PGA. Bob Harig writes that Reed’s success is a result of his more relaxed schedule after leaving LIV Golf.
With the NBA draft about a month away, Kevin Sweeney has updates on which players are going pro and which are going back to school.

The top five…

Mitch Marner scores a goal — Mitch Marner and the Golden Knights are headed to the Western Conference final. | Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

… things I saw yesterday:
5. Rory McIlroy’s one-word reaction to his four-over first round.
4. An impressive juggling home run robbery by Brewers prospect Jordyn Adams.
3. The prank Bubba Chandler’s Pirates teammates played on him during their game against the Rockies.
2. Mitch Marner’s elite stickhandling for the Golden Knights’ first goal against the Ducks. Vegas went on to win easily, 5–1, and advance to the Western Conference final against the Avalanche.
1. Nicole Gosling’s game-tying goal with two seconds on the clock for the Montreal Victoire in the first game of the PWHL championship series against the Ottawa Charge. The goal came immediately after Montreal star Laura Stacey suffered an apparently serious leg injury with 18 seconds left. Montreal went on to win in OT on a goal by Abby Roque.

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