We don’t know who they will be playing, but we know when the Seattle Seahawks will take the field for their first official snaps of the 2026 regular season. It has been officially announced the Seahawks will kick off the 2026 season on Wednesday, September 9th at 5:00 pm Pacific Time. Seattle is getting the Wednesday night action because the NFL has scheduled the Rams and 49ers to play on Thursday night due to the fact they are facing off in Australia, and thanks to the time differences, Thursday night is when the game would actually be broadcast in America.

Actually, we’ve known this for quite a while now. This isn’t breaking news to the Seahawks Wire faithful readers, who would have seen our reporting on this topic a little over a week ago. We at Seahawks Wire touched on Seattle kicking things off on a Wednesday night in an article published on Tuesday, March 17th.

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Right now the mystery remains just who will also be participating in the opening game as Seattle’s opponent. The schedule has not been released yet, and will become known later this spring. We know based on the Rams and Niners playing down under that it won’t be either of them, which leaves seven other potential matchups:

First off, wow, guess the Seahawks got all the teams that start with the letter “C” on their schedule. Second, let us think about who the opponent will be. Right off the bat we can scratch off the Cardinals and Giants. No one wants to watch those teams in prime time to begin the year. I don’t believe the NFL would have the Super Bowl rematch happen in Week 1. The last time that happened was Week 1 of the 2016 season between the Broncos and Panthers.

The Cowboys are always an option given their national brand, but they did open the season against the Eagles last year, so perhaps the NFL might save them for Sunday or Monday night. Of course, the league could make the Chiefs the opponent for the Seahawks, giving them an instant rematch against their Super Bowl MVP in Kenneth Walker III.

But the team I think will be the opponent will be da Bears. When the Seahawks opened the season in 2014, they had Aaron Rodgers’ Packers. I think given how explosive and electric Chicago was in 2025, the league will want to highlight Caleb Williams’ growing star power. That is my official prediction, but of course, we at Seahawks Wire will monitor the situation as we always do and report as soon as news break.

This article originally appeared on Seahawks Wire: 2026 NFL season: Seahawks opening game date and time announced