College Football Playoff makes official 12-team expansion beginning in 2024-25 season

The College Football Playoff will officially triple in size from its current four teams beginning in the 2024-25 season. The CFP’s Board of Mangers has formally approved a 12-team field that will increase access to the playoff, along with revenue for the CFP and its associated parties.

“We’re delighted to be moving forward,” said CFP executive director Bill Hancock. “When the board expanded the playoff beginning in 2026 and asked the CFP Management Committee to examine the feasibility of starting the new format earlier, the Management Committee went right to work. More teams and more access mean more excitement for fans, alumni, students and student-athletes. We appreciate the leaders of the six bowl games and the two future national championship game host cities for their cooperation. Everyone realized that this change is in the best interest of college football and pulled together to make it happen.”

The first round of the 2024-25 playoff will take place throughout the week ending Saturday, Dec. 21; the CFP will attempt to schedule those first-round games later in that week. Games will be hosted either at home stadiums of the highest-seeded teams in those games or other sites chosen by that programs for logistical purposes. Those extra games are expected to general roughly $450 million in revenue from ESPN for the CFP and its members

The expanded 12-team bracket will feature the six highest-ranked conference champions as automatic qualifiers along with the next six highest-ranked teams. The four highest-ranked conference champions will be seeded 1-4 with first-round byes. The next four highest-ranked teams (Nos. 5-8) will host the first-round matchups. The CFP Selection Committee will continue to determine weekly ratings with criteria to be reevaluated in the future.

While dates still need to be worked out, the game locations for the quarterfinals, semifinals and national championships across the 2024-25 and 2025-26 playoffs have already been determined.

“On behalf of the Management Committee and the Board of Managers, this is thrilling,” Hancock added. “It’s been a long process, but we are pleased that more teams and more students will have the opportunity to compete for the national championship beginning in the 2024 season. A new era of college football is about to begin. I look forward to it.”

The rubber stamp from the playoff board was given after the Rose Bowl acquiesced Wednesday night, agreeing to fall in line with the event’s scheduling policy instead of demanding to play in its traditional time slot at 5 p.m. ET on Jan. 1. That time slot is considered one of the most valuable in sports television. The agreement signed by the Rose Bowl, like the ones signed by the other big “contract bowls,” likely creates significantly more flexibility in that scheduling process.

In an expanded playoff, the games themselves are more important than the bowls that host the contests. The Rose Bowl refusing to comply with a more uniform scheduling policy would have delayed expansion until 2026 after the CFP’s current contract with ESPN ends. That would have cost involved parties an estimated $450 million in added revenue, and it may have kept the Rose Bowl out of the selection process once a new contract was signed.

Over the years, every BCS/CFP scheduling decision — until now — has accommodated the Rose Bowl being able to broadcast its game at its preferred time slot 5 p.m. time slot on or around New Year’s Day. The game has traditionally been scheduled to follow the Tournament of Roses of Parade. The timing was such that the sun would always set in the West over the San Gabriel Mountains during the game, thus creating one of the most iconic settings in American sports.

Instead, the Rose Bowl will play a part of the 12-team playoff, regardless of date and time, as college football’s biggest postseason gets a facelift.