1. League Structure

The BFL consists of two conferences, made up of 2 divisions of four teams. Division Champions receive priority seeding but do not receive automatic byes.

2. Standings

2.1 NFL Affiliate Assignment

From the 2025 BFL Season onward, each BFL team is assigned an NFL affiliate based on the previous NFL season’s playoff field and originally matched alphabetically by City/Region of the NFL team:

• 7 AFC playoff teams
• 7 NFC playoff teams
• Plus the next-best non-playoff team in each conference

From 2027, NFL Affiliates top seeds are matched against the BFL top seed per conference from seeds #1-#8 from the previous season with effect from the 2026 NFL season, which replaces the previous system of matching in alphabetical order. Seeds will be shown on the final standings to aid the alignment with NFL affiliates for the next season.

This means that the best AFC/NFC teams from the previous NFL season are matched against that of the teams from the previous BFL season' standings which brings an added strength of the competition to the league and emans top performing teams get the best affiliation and protentially a better opportunity of qualifying for the playoffs.

This creates 8 affiliates per conference. Teams are seeded 1–8 within their conference, regardless of NFL division champions.

Before 2025, the top six NFL affiliates were selected strictly by overall record, without using the NFL’s playoff qualification system.

2.2 Final Standings Calculation

Final BFL standings are determined after NFL Week 11 using:

• NFL affiliate win–loss record
• NFL tiebreakers

Net Points (NP) were discontinued after the 2024 season.

Due to AMT Gridiron being UK-based, standings will be released after Week 11.

2.3 Tie Rules

If an NFL affiliate finishes with a tie:

• If only one affiliate has a tie that season, that team is awarded an automatic win.
• If two or more affiliates have ties, they are ranked using NFL tiebreakers, with priority given to any BFL division champion among them.

To date, only one affiliate tie has occurred in a season (2021 and 2025), and both resulted in an automatic win.

3. Playoffs

3.1 Overtime Procedure

The final full-time score determines the winner. If tied:

1. Quarter-by-quarter scores are added sequentially as overtime (Q1 → Q2 → Q3 → Q4).
2. If still tied, individual scoring plays (TD, FG, Safety) from the game week are added in order.
3. This continues until an outright winner is determined.

There is no limit to the number of overtime scores used.

Example:
2023 BFL Championship Game — tied 33–33 after regulation.
OT used 1st-quarter scores:
Caledonian Knights (3) & Sussex Pirates (7).
Final: Sussex Pirates 40–36.

3.2 Bye Weeks During Playoffs

Since the NFL expanded to a 17-game season in 2021, BFL playoff weeks may include NFL bye weeks.

• BFL Playoffs correspond to NFL Weeks 12–14 as per 2015-2019 (Weeks 14–16 during 2020–2024).
• If an NFL affiliate has a bye during the playoffs, the team uses its most recent played week for its score.

From 2026, Conference teams will be seeded with Division Champions receiving the top seeds and guaranteed homefield advantage:

• Division champions: seeds #1-#2
• Wildcards: seeds #3-#4

For 2025 only, due to the inauguaral season of the implementation of Conference playoffs, Conference teams were seeded regardless of Division champions and based on record only.

From 2015-2024, no seeding was in place due to the implementation of divisional playoffs but Division champions received automatic byes into the Division Finals.

4. BFL Bowl Hosts

From 2027, the BFL Bowl will be hosted on a rotational system featuring the BFL anchor hosts of Cardiff, Edinburgh, London, and Manchester starting with the 2027 BFL Bowl. An additional host will replace one of the Anchor hosts each cycle, made up of four seasons, on a rotation from the individual divisions North, West, Central and South. Once all hosts have been selected, the cycle will return to the anchor hosts.

Visit the Host Cities Schedule page.

Host Cities Schedule

Next additional hosts will be

• Brighton (South), Hull (North), Sheffield (West) and Leicester (Central)
• Bristol (South), Newcastle (North), Leeds (West) and Nottingham (Central)

This means that Milton Keynes (Central) will be chosen as the last host of the cycle schedule

From 2015-2026, Wembley Stadium was the host of the BFL Bowl and BFL Championship Game before its rebrand in 2025. Wembley Stadium was chosen as the host due to its size and capacity.