The Seahawks full schedule will be released Thursday
Published 9:49 am Tuesday, May 12, 2026
As football fans anxiously await Thursday’s release of the full NFL 2026 regular-season schedule, it’s sometimes forgotten that we already know each team’s schedule for 2026.
Sort of.
The NFL’s schedule release day is a big deal for many reasons. Fans can set their calendars and make their travel plans, knowing exactly when their team is playing. They can also map out advantages and disadvantages, such as playing a team like the Kansas City Chiefs early in the season when Patrick Mahomes might still be getting back to full speed after his ACL tear. For players and coaches, there is strong interest in knowing where long homestands and road trips fall, as well as when they get the bye week.
But the opponents have been set in stone since the end of the last regular season. The league has a fairly simple formula that makes it easy to track not only the 17 opponents for each team, but also which opponents will be at home and on the road. As we demonstrate the formula below, we will use the defending Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks and the Las Vegas Raiders, who ended up with the No. 1 pick in the 2026 NFL draft as the worst team in 2025, as our guides.
Six division games
There are 32 teams in the NFL, with 16 in the American Football Conference (AFC) and 16 in the National Football Conference (NFC). Those teams are further divided into four divisions per conference: East, West, North and South. The most consistent part of any team’s schedule is that they play each of the other three teams in their division two times, once at home and once on the road.
Seahawks: San Francisco 49ers (home and road), Los Angeles Rams (home and road), Arizona Cardinals (home and road)
Raiders: Denver Broncos (home and road), Kansas City Chiefs (home and road), Los Angeles Chargers (home and road)
Four games against one division in the same conference
Each year, all four teams from one division are assigned to play another division in the same conference. For example, this year, the NFC West is scheduled to play against the NFC East, so the Seahawks will play the Dallas Cowboys, Washington Commanders, New York Giants and Philadelphia Eagles. Two of these games will be at home in Seattle, while the other two will be on the road. The home-road split is on a rotational basis. The last time the NFC West played against the NFC East was the 2023 season and the Seahawks hosted the Eagles and Commanders and traveled to Dallas and New York. This year, they will host the Cowboys and Giants and travel to Washington and Philadelphia.
The AFC West plays the AFC East this season, while the NFC North matches up with the NFC South and the AFC North does the same with the AFC South.
Seahawks: Cowboys (home), Giants (home), Commanders (road), Eagles (road)
Raiders: Miami Dolphins (home), Buffalo Bills (home), New England Patriots (road), New York Jets (road)
Four games against one division in the opposite conference
Similar logic applies to this set of games as with the section above. Given that there are four divisions to rotate through in the opposite conference as opposed to three in the same conference, these matchups are typically rarer.
For example, Tom Brady entered the league in 2000 and played the Cowboys just five times during his 20 years with the New England Patriots. Because the teams are only guaranteed to play each other every four years and the teams rotate home and road for each matchup, Brady only played in Dallas twice in his 20 years with New England. Compare that with Brady’s final three seasons in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who are in the same conference as the Cowboys, when Brady played against Dallas twice in the regular season and once in the playoffs.
This season, the NFC West plays the AFC West, the NFC East plays the AFC South, the NFC North plays the AFC East and the NFC South plays the AFC North.
Seahawks: Chiefs (home), Chargers (home), Raiders (road), Broncos (road)
Raiders: Rams (home), Seahawks (home), Cardinals (road), 49ers (road)
Two games against teams from the other two divisions in the same conference
In terms of inter-conference games, it’s already been outlined that teams play six games within their own division and four against another division. They also play one team from each of the other two divisions in their own conference, playing the teams that finished in the same place in the standings as they did the previous year. For example, the Seahawks won the NFC West in 2025, so they will play the division winners from the NFC North (Bears) and NFC South (Panthers). Meanwhile, the Raiders finished last in the AFC West, so they’ll play the last-place finishers in the AFC North (Cleveland Browns) and AFC South (Tennessee Titans). This is why teams that finished with a poor record one season tend to have an easier schedule the following year (although other factors, such as the strength of their own division, play a role).
Seahawks: Bears (home), Panthers (road)
Raiders: Titans (home), Browns (road)
The 17th game
The NFL added a 17th game to the schedule in 2021. For this game, each team plays another team from the opposite conference in a division they are not already scheduled to play. Like the two inter-conference games above, this game is slotted depending on where the team finished in their own division. The Seahawks finished atop the NFC West and their division is already scheduled to play against the AFC West in 2026, as detailed above. For 2026, the NFC West will host the AFC East in these matchups, so the Seahawks will have a Super Bowl rematch with the New England Patriots.
The remaining divisional pairings include the NFC East facing the AFC North, the NFC North facing the AFC South and the NFC South facing the AFC West. The NFC will host all these matchups in 2026 as the designated conference with nine home games.
Seahawks: Patriots (home)
Raiders: New Orleans Saints (road)
Because all of the factors involved are either in rotation or based on regular-season finishes in the standings, the opponents for each team, as well as whether the game will be at home or on the road, can be written in ink the day the previous regular season ends.
