The College Football Playoff said on Friday that a formal agreement with ESPN over future media rights is in the final stages of review, moving the sport closer to a 24-team postseason field. The agreement covers the media rights tied to expanding the playoff from 12 teams to 24, and the College Football Playoff said a decision will be made after the review is complete. The announcement came on the same day the first College Football Playoff rankings of the season were released, with Miami on top.
“A formal agreement between the CFP and ESPN regarding future media rights in connection with potential expansion is in the final stages of review by the CFP,” the organization said in a statement. “A decision on the agreement will be made following this review. We will provide additional updates when appropriate.” The statement did not set a date for the decision, and it did not confirm that expansion will happen, but it marked the furthest the talks have gone in public.
College Football Playoff deal still needs board approval
ESPN and the College Football Playoff reached a handshake agreement in October to broadcast a 24-team playoff starting with the 2027 season, according to ESPN. The network would pay an average of $345 million more per year for the larger field, covering five years. The extra money sits on top of the six-year, $7.8 billion deal ESPN signed in March 2024, which runs through the 2031-32 season and pays an average of $1.3 billion a year. That deal already covers a field of up to 14 teams at no added cost, which is why the jump to 24 teams needed a separate negotiation.
Nothing has been signed yet, and the boards of all the parties involved must still approve the deal. The College Football Playoff’s presidential oversight board and the conferences will need to sign off before the agreement is final. A formal deadline for any format change sits on 1 December, though conference officials can agree to extend it if the talks run long. ESPN can also sublicense up to half of the 12 additional games created by expansion to another broadcaster, according to reporting by On3.
College Football Playoff format under the 24-team plan
The format under discussion would include 19 at-large selections, automatic spots for the four Power 4 champions and one spot for the highest-ranked Group of 6 team. The top eight seeds would receive a first-round bye and host a second-round game on campus. Seeds 9 through 24 would play first-round games on the campuses of the higher seeds, with games possibly starting as early as a Thursday in the second weekend of December. Quarterfinals would continue around New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day at bowl sites, with the semifinals and the national championship game staying at their scheduled bowl and neutral sites in January.
The change would end the 12-team bracket after three seasons. The playoff expanded from four teams to 12 in 2024, and the current format gives automatic bids to five conference champions and seven at-large spots to the highest-ranked remaining teams. A 24-team field would double the number of postseason places and give far more teams a path into the bracket, though the selection committee would still rank the teams and set the seeds.
College Football Playoff expansion and the calendar
Expanding the field would also change the shape of the regular season. The Power 4 conference championship games are expected to end to free up room in the calendar, and the season would start a week earlier to fit the extra round of games. ESPN currently holds the rights to the ACC, Big 12 and SEC championship games, and the cost of absorbing those rights is part of the money in the new deal. The field would also be capped at 24 teams through 2031 under the terms reported by On3, so the bracket would stay the same size for the five seasons from 2027 to 2031.
For now, the 2026 season will continue under the 12-team format. The national championship game for the 2026 season is set for 25 January 2027 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. The College Football Playoff will announce its next step once the review of the ESPN agreement is done, and that announcement will show whether the sport moves to 24 teams and when the change takes effect.