How does the NFL schedule work? Who decides the matchups?

Though you might not believe it, NFL executives work in tandem with thousands of cloud-based computers to produce thousands of possible schedules before finally settling on the best possible one for the 272-game schedule of the regular season.

Who makes the NFL schedule?

As mentioned before there are six NFL schedule makers. They are Vice President of Broadcasting Michael North, Senior Vice President of Broadcasting Howard Katz, Senior Director of Broadcasting Blake Jones, Director of Broadcasting Charlotte Carey, Vice President of Broadcasting Onnie Bose, and Broadcasting Senior Coordinator Lucy Popko. Now, as you can probably imagine, the six must consider the fans, the league’s broadcast partners, and a whole host of external factors when they are creating the 272-game schedule that plays out across the 18 weeks of the NFL season.

One such factor is events i.e. shows, concerts, conferences, etc. which are already scheduled in or near NFL stadiums. These can compete with games, put undue stress on the playing surface, or at the very least create traffic or logistical problems. In light of this, the league usually begins to collect information from clubs in January about any events that may present such issues or create scheduling conflicts. There are also internal factors to be considered. For example, a formula determines each team’s opponents every year, and a rotating schedule ensures that every team plays each of the other 31 at least once in a four-year period.

How is the NFL schedule made?

For starters, you’ve got the league’s 32 teams which are split into two conferences - the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The 16 teams in each conference are in turn split into the East, North, South, and West divisions, with every division consisting of four teams. The season is 18 weeks long with every team will playing 17 regular-season games and having one bye week. Teams will alternate seasons where they host nine regular-season games and one preseason game, or eight regular-season games and two preseason games. This coming season, the AFC will have nine regular-season home games. For a concise breakdown of how that works, take a look below:

OK, but how does the NFL determine when games will be played?

Once the schedule for the season has been set, the next step for the schedule makers is to work with broadcast partners to determine when every game will be played. Where marquee matchups are concerned, the league usually schedules them to air during the week’s premier time slots - Thursday, Sunday, or Monday nights or the late game on Sunday afternoons. The league typically schedules the Super Bowl champion at home for the Thursday night game that kicks off the new season.

The league also schedules games on the Saturdays of Weeks 15, 16, and 18. In Week 15, three of the five designated matchups are played on Saturday, while the remainder are played on Sunday. Specific dates and start times for the designated Week 15 matchups are determined and announced later during the season. In Week 18, two games will be played on Saturday with the remainder being played on Sunday. Specific dates, start times, and networks for Week 18 matchups will be determined and announced after the conclusion of Week 17. Additionally, Week 16 will feature a Saturday doubleheader split between NBC and Peacock. That week will also feature a Christmas Day tripleheader on CBS, FOX, and ABC.

To be clear, most NFL games are played on Sunday afternoons, with early games starting at 1:00 p.m. ET and the late games starting at either 4:05 p.m. ET or 4:25 p.m. ET, depending on whether the game is part of a network doubleheader. The Sunday afternoon games are broadcast on CBS and FOX; and for the first time ever, games do not have a predetermined network assignment based on the conference affiliation of participating teams. This of course allows schedule makers greater flexibility in building Sunday afternoon windows across CBS and FOX.

There’s also a NFL International Series, right?

That’s correct. If you recall, the league introduced an interesting tweak to the schedule back in 2007 with the NFL International Series. Simply put, each team is guaranteed to play internationally at least once every eight years. In the coming season, football will cross the Atlantic with games scheduled in the United Kingdom and Germany (three games in London and one in Frankfurt), while South America will get a game in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Understandably, scheduling these matchups presents a challenge for schedule makers, which is precisely why the International Series games are addressed early on in the process to handle things such as the stresses of long travel and the allocation of bye weeks.

What’s this about Flex Scheduling?

So, back In 2006, the NFL introduced a “flexible scheduling” procedure for NBC’s “Sunday Night Football.” The thinking behind Flex scheduling was to ensure that the Sunday night games would feature a top tier primetime matchup. For the coming season, we just might see flex scheduling for Sunday night being used twice between Weeks 5-10, Weeks 11-15 and Week 17. It’s worth noting that In flex scheduling weeks, the games listed for the Sunday night window are tentative and subject to change. Only Sunday afternoon games are eligible to move to Sunday night, in which the tentatively scheduled Sunday night game would move to a Sunday afternoon. In case you’re wondering, Sunday afternoon games can also be moved between the 1 p.m. ET, 4:05 p.m. ET, or 4:25 p.m. ET time slots.

Also worth noting that flex scheduling will be applied to ESPN’s “Monday Night Football.” This flexibility will be available in Weeks 12-15 and 17, allowing the NFL to move a different game into Monday Night Football and allowing the originally scheduled Monday night game to go back to Sunday afternoon. Monday Night Football flex scheduling decisions will be made with 13 days’ notice.