{"id":904154,"date":"2026-05-29T05:57:56","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T05:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/904154\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T05:57:56","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T05:57:56","slug":"the-2026-nfl-playoff-bracket-the-path-to-super-bowl-lx-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/904154\/","title":{"rendered":"The 2026 NFL Playoff Bracket: The Path to Super Bowl LX, Explained"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether your team made it in or you\u2019re just watching from the sidelines, all eyes are on the NFL Playoffs<\/a> as we round the corner toward the final stretch of elimination games leading up to Super Bowl LX<\/a> on February 8.<\/p>\n

How to Watch<\/p>\n

Watch Sunday Night Football on NBC<\/a> and streaming on Peacock<\/a>.<\/p>\n

NBC and Peacock<\/a> will have the big game in all its pageantry and glory (and must-watch Super Bowl ads, of course!) when Super Bowl LX<\/a> kicks off from Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California. But between then and now, there\u2019s a lot of football yet to play \u2014 and it\u2019s all carefully organized according to an NFL Playoff structure<\/a> designed to leave no doubt about which two teams<\/a> belong in the final Super Bowl spotlight.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ready to get into the inner workings of team seedings, brackets, and all the rest of the rules that make the NFL Playoffs tick? Keep on scrolling for the basics on how the pro football postseason works!<\/p>\n

RELATED:\u00a0When Is the Super Bowl in 2026? What to Know for Super Bowl LX<\/a><\/p>\n

Explaining the 2026 NFL Playoff bracket<\/p>\n

From now until Super Bowl Sunday, every NFL Playoff game will feature competition only between pairs of teams that each belong to the same conference. For that reason, you can think of the NFL Playoff bracket as essentially two brackets that each follow the exact same formula: one bracket for the NFC, and another identically structured bracket for the AFC.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The NFL postseason plays out across four Playoff rounds, each falling on consecutive weekends until only two teams remain. After that, there\u2019s a week-long pause as the remaining two contenders (not to mention almost every hype-fueled\u00a0player in global media) make their final preparations for the Super Bowl, followed by the season\u2019s final game on Super Bowl Sunday.<\/p>\n

How does the Wild Card round work in the NFL Playoffs?<\/p>\n

The Playoffs begin with the Wild Card round, followed by the Divisional Round, the Conference Championships, and, at the end, the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n

There are 14 teams in all who qualified for the Playoffs, but for the Wild Card round, only the lowest 12 seeded teams will play.\u00a0As of now, we\u2019ve got a complete picture of the full 12-team Wild Card bracket<\/a> \u2014\u00a0so it makes sense to explain how the teams within that bracket are assigned.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Wild Card round features six games \u2014\u00a0three within the NFC, and three within the AFC \u2014\u00a0between 12 of the NFL\u2019s 14 playoff teams. The two teams that don\u2019t play during Wild Card weekend represent the top-seeded teams from the regular season who earned both a first-round bye as well as home-field advantage within their conference for the duration of their stay in the NFL Playoffs. This year, the No. 1-seeded teams are the Seattle Seahawks (NFC) and the Denver Broncos (AFC).\u00a0<\/p>\n

The rest of the Wild Card bracket (Seeds 2-7) is determined by a two-tiered pecking order: Seeds 2-4 represent teams that won their Division within each conference, while Seeds 5-7 represent the top remaining teams from each conference that have the best regular season record (with tie breaks factored in).<\/p>\n

As you\u2019ll find with most other team sports, the NFL Playoffs are designed to be an uphill battle for the lowest-seeded teams, who each are pitted against higher-seeded competition all throughout their playoff run. For the Wild Card round, here\u2019s how that looks for this year\u2019s playoff field:<\/p>\n

No. 1 seed \u00a0(NFC \u2014\u00a0Seattle; AFC \u2014\u00a0Denver) \u2014\u00a0Neither team plays during the Wild Card round thanks to an earned by week.<\/p>\n

No. 2 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0Chicago, the NFC North Division winners; AFC \u2014\u00a0New England, the AFC East Division winners) \u2014\u00a0Hosts the No. 7 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0Green Bay, who earned a Wild Card berth; AFC \u2014\u00a0Los Angeles Chargers, who also earned a Wild Card berth)<\/p>\n

No. 3 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0Philadelphia, the NFC East Division winners; AFC \u2014\u00a0Jacksonville, the AFC South Division winners) \u2014 Hosts the No. 6 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0San Francisco, who earned a Wild Card berth; AFC \u2014\u00a0Buffalo, who also earned a Wild Card berth)<\/p>\n

No. 4 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0Carolina, the NFC South Division winners; AFC \u2014\u00a0Pittsburgh, the AFC North Division winners) \u2014\u00a0Hosts the No. 5 seed (NFC \u2014\u00a0Los Angeles Rams, who earned a Wild Card berth; AFC \u2014\u00a0Los Angeles Chargers, who also earned a Wild Card berth)<\/p>\n

RELATED:\u00a0Which Teams Made the NFL Playoffs? Seedings, Schedule for All 14 Postseason Teams<\/a><\/p>\n

How does the Divisional round work in the NFL Playoffs?<\/p>\n

There are four Playoff games in the Divisional round, and as you can tell from the Wild Card team pairings above, it\u2019s the numeric seeding that matters in determining which teams play each other in the NFL Playoffs \u2014\u00a0rather than forcing head-to-head matchups between Division winners.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the Divisional round, the remaining eight top-seeded teams (including the two No. 1 seeds who didn\u2019t play during the Wild Card round) square off against the lowest-seeded teams who advanced thanks to winning their Wild Card matchups. The No. 1 seeds (Seattle in the NFC; Denver in the AFC) will host the lowest-seeded team that remains; while the second-highest remaining seeds will host the second-lowest remaining seeds that survived the NFL\u2019s Wild Card weekend.<\/p>\n

RELATED:\u00a0Everything to Know About Super Bowl LX: Time, Location, Halftime Show & More<\/a><\/p>\n

How do the Conference Championships work in the NFL Playoffs?<\/p>\n

This one\u2019s pretty straightforward. With only four NFL teams remaining and two games to play, Conference Championship weekend is all about matching up the best with the best. The two remaining Playoff teams from the NFC, as well as the two who remain in the AFC, will meet in a pair of Conference Championship games to determine which two will survive and advance to represent the NFC and AFC in Super Bowl LX.\u00a0<\/p>\n

How can you watch Super Bowl LX on NBC and Peacock?<\/p>\n

Super Bowl LX<\/a> kicks off on Sunday, February 8, 2026 from Levi\u2019s Stadium in Santa Clara, California (home field of the San Francisco 49ers). The game will be aired exclusively on NBC and stream on Peacock<\/a>, encompassing a full afternoon of pregame buildup before the main event itself.<\/p>\n

Not yet a Peacock subscriber? Click here<\/a> to get started!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Whether your team made it in or you\u2019re just watching from the sidelines, all eyes are on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":904155,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[22939,7,1372,6,84,5426,4032,13724],"class_list":["post-904154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl-playoffs","tag-evergreen","tag-football","tag-nbc-sports","tag-nfl","tag-nfl-playoffs","tag-peacock","tag-sunday-night-football","tag-where-to-watch"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116656334696647961","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=904154"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904154\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/904155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=904154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=904154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=904154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}