Super League to expand to 14 teams from 2026

Wigan Warriors won a historic quadruple of trophies in 2024 but were second in the end-of-season club rankings, with St Helens taking top spot

Super League's 12 current clubs have voted to expand the competition to 14 teams from next season.

In a statement, the league said the expansion would take place by combining the club grading system with an independent panel.

The panel is to be chaired by Lord Jonathan Caine, who was recently elected to the RFL's board, as well as the strategic review sub-committee.

The top 12 clubs under the grading system at the end of 2025 will be joined by two clubs recommended by the panel "provided there are two applications of sufficient merit against the set criteria".

It will be the first time since 2014 that the league will have operated with 14 teams, having dipped down to 12 for the 2015 campaign.

The decision to expand was made following a meeting of member clubs at Headingley on Monday.

Clubs have been graded under media giant IMG and Rugby League Commercial's 'Reimagining Rugby League' initiative in the past two seasons, but only 2025's league structure has been decided by its criteria, which saw London replaced by Wakefield in the top flight for this term.

Under the system, Super League, Championship and League One clubs are assessed based on points calculated by on and off-field performance in order to decide who will make up the top flight, rather than promotion and relegation between the divisions.

After the reduction to 12 teams 10 years ago, Super League has operated a loop fixture system, where teams fill the gap in fixtures by playing additional matches against four teams.

Those fixtures are currently decided based on league placings from the previous season.

Since 2015, the league has operated a number of structures, including a late-season split structure during which clubs would play 23 games and then be divided into three pools of eight, involving the 24 teams making up Super League and the Championship.

The top 'Super 8s' group played seven further games, with the top four at that stage progressing to contest places in the Super League Grand Final.

However, that format was ended before the 2019 campaign which saw each top-flight team play a total of 29 regular season fixtures, including six additional loop games.

In 2022, after two Covid-affected seasons, that was reduced to the 27-game format currently in use.