2026 NBA playoffs
| Tournament details | |
|---|---|
| Dates | April 18 – June 2026[a] |
| Season | 2025–26 |
| Teams | 16 |
The 2026 NBA playoffs is the upcoming postseason tournament of the National Basketball Association's 2025–26 season. The playoffs will begin on April 18 and will end with the conclusion of the 2026 NBA Finals.
Overview
Updates to postseason appearances
- The Oklahoma City Thunder will make the playoffs for the third consecutive season.
- The San Antonio Spurs will make the playoffs for the first time since 2019.
- The Detroit Pistons will make the playoffs for the second consecutive season.
- The Indiana Pacers will miss the playoffs for the first time since 2023. They were the defending Eastern Conference champions from 2025
- The Brooklyn Nets and Sacramento Kings will miss the playoffs for the third consecutive season.
- The Utah Jazz will miss the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season.
- The Washington Wizards will miss the playoffs for the fifth consecutive season.
Format
Eight teams from each conference participated in the playoffs. The top six teams in each conference, based on winning percentage, directly qualified for the playoffs; the seeding order of those teams was also based on winning percentage. If two or more teams had the same record, standard NBA tiebreaker rules were used.
The NBA Board of Governors adopted a format starting in 2021 to have a play-in tournament involving the teams ranked 7th through 10th in each conference. The 7th place team and 8th place team participated in a "double-chance" game, with the winner advancing to the playoffs as the 7-seed. The loser then played the winner of the elimination game between the 9th place and 10th place teams to determine the playoff's 8-seed. The NBA's regular playoff format then proceeded as normal. Furthermore, the winner of the match between the loser of the 7/8 game and the winner of the 9/10 game always plays on day 2 of the NBA playoffs to allow that team at least a day of rest.[2]
Each conference's bracket was fixed with no reseeding. All rounds were a best-of-seven series; a series ended when one team won four games, and that team advanced to the next round. All rounds, including the NBA Finals, were in a 2–2–1–1–1 format with regards to hosting. In the conference playoffs, home-court advantage went to the higher-seeded team (number one being the highest). For the NBA Finals, home-court advantage went to the team with the better regular season record, and, if needed, ties were broken based on head-to-head record, followed by intra-conference record.
Playoff qualifying
On March 17, 2026, the Oklahoma City Thunder became the first team to clinch a playoff spot.[3] While noted in the below tables, division titles have no bearing on seeding.[4]
The below tables reflect current playoff positioning and are subject to change through the end of the regular season (April 12). Seeds 7 and 8 in each conference are not finalized until the first-stage play-in tournament is completed (April 14–17).
Eastern Conference
| Seed | Team | Record | Clinched | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Play-in berth | Playoff berth | Division title | Best record in conference |
Best record in NBA | |||
| 1 | Detroit Pistons | 51–19 | — | March 20 | |||
| 2 | Boston Celtics | 47–23 | |||||
| 3 | New York Knicks | 46–25 | |||||
| 4 | Cleveland Cavaliers | 43–27 | |||||
| 5 | Toronto Raptors | 39–30 | |||||
| 6 | Orlando Magic | 38–31 | |||||
| † | Atlanta Hawks | 38–32 | |||||
| † | Miami Heat | 38–32 | |||||
| † | Philadelphia 76ers | 38–32 | |||||
| † | Charlotte Hornets | 36–34 | |||||
† Teams ranked 7 through 10 will participate in the play-in tournament to determine seeds 7 and 8.
Western Conference
| Seed | Team | Record | Clinched | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Play-in berth | Playoff berth | Division title | Best record in conference |
Best record in NBA | |||
| 1 | Oklahoma City Thunder | 55–15 | — | March 17[3] | March 18[5] | ||
| 2 | San Antonio Spurs | 52–18 | — | March 19[6] | |||
| 3 | Los Angeles Lakers | 45–25 | |||||
| 4 | Houston Rockets | 42–27 | |||||
| 5 | Denver Nuggets | 43–28 | — | ||||
| 6 | Minnesota Timberwolves | 43–28 | — | ||||
| † | Phoenix Suns | 39–31 | |||||
| † | Portland Trail Blazers | 35–36 | — | ||||
| † | Los Angeles Clippers | 34–36 | |||||
| † | Golden State Warriors | 33–37 | |||||
† Teams ranked 7 through 10 will participate in the play-in tournament to determine seeds 7 and 8.
Media coverage
This is the first postseason of new 11-year deals with the ESPN family of networks, NBC Sports and Amazon Prime Video.[7] All first-round playoff games will now be exclusive national games, and there will no longer be regional broadcasts.[8][9]
Amazon Prime Video will stream between nine and 17 first-round playoff games, and between five and nine second-round playoff games. ESPN and ABC will have approximately 18 games in the first two rounds. NBC Sports will produce between 22 and 34 games in the first two rounds, with at least half of them airing on NBC.[7]
As per the alternating rotation, NBC will have the Western Conference Finals this season, while ESPN/ABC will have the Eastern Conference Finals.[10][11] ABC has exclusive coverage of the NBA Finals for the 24th straight year.[7]
Peacock and ESPN DTC will also stream all NBC and ESPN/ABC games, respectively.[12][13]
Notes
References
- ^ "2026 NBA Play-in, Playoffs & Finals Schedule". NBA.com. March 2, 2026. Retrieved March 3, 2026.
- ^ Reynolds, Tim (July 12, 2022). "NBA adopts Play-In Tournament on full-time basis". Las Vegas: Warner Bros. Discovery Sports. Associated Press. Archived from the original on July 28, 2022. Retrieved July 28, 2022.
- ^ a b Pavon, Josue (March 17, 2026). "Thunder clinches playoff berth with win over Magic". Yahoo! Sports. Retrieved March 17, 2026.
- ^ Moore, Matt (September 9, 2015). "5 Things to Know: NBA division winners not guaranteed playoff spot". CBS Sports. Archived from the original on December 3, 2022. Retrieved April 6, 2023.
- ^ OKC THUNDER [@okcthunder] (March 19, 2026). "Thunder secures 8th Northwest Division title ⚡" (Tweet). Retrieved March 19, 2026 – via X (formerly Twitter).
- ^ Wright, Michael C. (March 19, 2026). "Spurs end 6-year playoff drought behind Wembanyama's game winner". ESPN.com. Retrieved March 20, 2026.
- ^ a b c Karangu, Jessie (September 2024). "Breaking down unsealed details of NBA's new deals with NBC, Amazon". Sports Media Watch. Retrieved July 11, 2025.
- ^ "National Priority: NBA moving first-round games off local TV". Sports Business Journal. April 18, 2025. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
- ^ "League Pass Blackouts". watch.nba.com. August 27, 2025. Retrieved October 15, 2025.
- ^ Rajan, Ronce (August 14, 2025). "ESPN & ABC's Star-Studded 2025-26 NBA Regular Season Broadcast Schedule". ESPN Press Room U.S. Retrieved August 14, 2025.
- ^ Lerner, Drew (October 14, 2025). "NBC leaning towards three-man booth for NBA conference finals". Awful Announcing. Retrieved October 24, 2025.
- ^ "The NBA and WNBA Return to NBCUniversal With 11-Year Agreement for Regular Season and Playoff Basketball on NBC, Peacock, USA Network, SKY Sports, and Telemund". NBC Sports (Press release). July 24, 2024.
- ^ Ota, Kevin (May 13, 2025). "New Direct-to-Consumer Offering to be Singularly Branded ESPN". ESPN Press Room (Press release). Retrieved July 11, 2025.