NFL Overtime Rules 2026: How Regular-Season and Playoff Overtime Differ, Including Ties and the Coin Toss

Since the 2025 rule change, NFL overtime generally gives both teams an opportunity to possess the ball, even after an opening-possession touchdown. Exceptions include an immediate defensive score, and in the regular season the 10-minute clock can expire before the second team completes or even begins its possession. What still differs is length and ties. Per the NFL Football Operations rulebook page, regular-season overtime is one 10-minute period and can end in a tie, while postseason overtime uses 15-minute periods until one team wins. This is the rule set as of Nov. 10, 2026.

Regular season vs. postseason at a glance

All of the above is from Rule 16 of the NFL rulebook as published on the NFL Football Operations site. The rulebook says a break of no more than three minutes separates the end of regulation and the start of overtime in both settings.

What the 2025 change did

Before 2025, a regular-season game could end if the team with the first possession scored a touchdown. That format dates to 2012 for the regular season, per ESPN’s 2022 report, which also noted that overtime was cut from a maximum of 15 minutes to 10 in 2017.

The postseason changed first. At the 2022 league meetings in Palm Beach, owners approved guaranteed possessions for playoff overtime only, by a 29-3 vote, per ESPN. That followed the Chiefs’ 42-36 playoff win over the Bills, per Sports Illustrated.

The regular season caught up in 2025. Owners approved a proposal from the Philadelphia Eagles on Tuesday, April 1, 2025, per ESPN. Sports Illustrated reported the vote as 32-0, citing a post by its reporter Albert Breer. The NFL’s own Featured Rules page describes the amendment as aligning postseason and regular-season overtime, subject to a 10-minute period in the regular season.

The Eagles’ version would have lengthened regular-season overtime to 15 minutes. That part was not adopted, per Sports Illustrated. Because the clock is still 10 minutes, the rulebook says a game ends after one period “even if the second team has not had an opportunity to possess the ball,” so the clock can cut a possession short.

Coin toss, kickoff and the second possession

• Coin toss: At the end of regulation, the referee tosses a coin at midfield and the visiting captain calls it, per the rulebook. The winner picks one of two pregame-style options: receive or kick, or which goal to defend.
• Kickoff counts as a possession: A kickoff is the receiving team’s opportunity to possess the ball. If the kicking team legally recovers the kick, the receiving team is still considered to have had its opportunity, per the rulebook.
• One way to end it early: If the team kicking off scores a safety on the receiving team’s first possession, the kicking team wins.
• Turnovers on the second possession: If the first team scores and the second team then throws an interception or fumbles, the down is played out and points count, the rulebook says.
• Postseason toss: At the start of the third overtime period, the captain who lost the first toss gets first choice, unless the winner deferred. After a fourth overtime period, there is another coin toss and play continues until someone wins.

Ties: two recent examples

Only regular-season games can end tied. In Week 4 of 2025, the Packers and Cowboys finished 40-40, which per CNN, via KVIA left only a 1964 tie (43-43) with more points. In Week 5 of 2026, the Giants and Commanders played to a 27-27 tie on Sunday, Oct. 11, per Pro Football Talk.

The Giants’ game report shows why a 10-minute period can run out: each team had two overtime possessions, the Giants’ kicker missed a 46-yard field goal on the first one, and neither side scored. We did not count how many games have ended in ties since the change, so we do not state a total.

How long a game can last

By our arithmetic, a regular-season game is at most 70 game-clock minutes (60 in regulation plus one 10-minute overtime). A postseason game that uses one full overtime period reaches 75 game-clock minutes (60 plus 15), and it keeps going if still tied. The rulebook describes regulation as four 15-minute periods, so regulation is 60 minutes.

What we could not verify

NFL Football Operations’ separate overtime page did not load its text for us, so we relied on the rulebook and Featured Rules pages. Neither gives the owners’ vote counts. The 29-3 vote is from ESPN, and the 32-0 vote is from Sports Illustrated quoting a reporter’s post. We also cannot rule out a later rule change that affects overtime.