How does the NFL work?
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The National Football League (NFL) is the top level of American Football in the United States and consists of 32 teams.
The franchises are split evenly into two conferences, the American Football Conference (AFC) and National Football Conference (NFC).
The AFC and NFC are based on which teams were in the old American Football League and National Football League prior to a merger in 1970.
Tweaks have been made since then following the additions of new teams and since the arrival of the Houston Texans in 2002, the NFL has used four divisions of four teams within the two conferences.
Seven teams from each conference at the end of the season will advance into the post-season.
From there, those teams in each conference separate knockout competitions to decide a season winner from the AFC and NFC.
The AFC and NFC champions will then meet at Super Bowl LX on 8 February 2026 to be crowned overall NFL champions.
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How do the conferences, divisions and fixtures work?
Philadelphia Eagles, who head into the 2025 season as defending champions, will play in the NFC East
Both the AFC and NFC are split into four divisions, with four teams in each division.
Both conferences have north, south, east and west divisions.
During the regular season, each team plays 17 matches across the 18-week campaign, with all teams given one "bye" week during the season.
Selected via a strict scheduling algorithm, NFL teams will typically play against all three teams in their division home and away, all four teams from a single division in the AFC once and all four teams from a single division in the NFC once.
The other three games are made up of additional intraconference games.
The four division winners from each conference advance to the post season, as well as the three best teams from each conference not to win their division.
The post-season
How are teams sorted into conferences in the NFL?
A total of 14 teams start in the post-season, seven from each conference.
The best team from the regular season from each conference advances straight into the divisional play-offs. The other six teams play a one-off match against each other to qualify for the play-offs.
In the play-offs, the highest-ranked team in each conference faces the lowest-ranked team in that conference, with the other two teams meeting in the other play-off match.
The winner of the play-off match faces each other for the NFC and AFC championships respectively.
The winner of those championship matches will then face off in the season-finale: the Super Bowl.
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