The 2026-2027 College Football Playoff schedule is out, and something’s noticeably different this year. Beyond the national championship sliding into late January, ESPN, college football’s main broadcast partner since the playoff began, is pulling back in a way fans weren’t expecting.

The College Football Playoff, ESPN, and TNT Sports have announced the schedule for the 2026-2027 College Football Playoff games. Clay Travis of Outkick first reported ESPN’s sale of broadcasting rights in its expanded CFP deal. ESPN, which has been the broadcaster of the CFP since its inception in 2015, recently expanded its package, including five sub-licensed games to TNT Sports.

The College Football Playoff includes 11 games: four first-round games, four quarterfinal games, two semifinal games, and the national championship game. Of all 11 games, ESPN has full broadcasting rights for just two games: one in the first round and the other in the quarterfinals.

As per CFP’s official website, the playoffs will begin on Friday, Dec. 18, at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN, with a first-round game. For the first-round games on Saturday, December 19, ABC and ESPN will broadcast the first game, while TNT will broadcast the rest at 3:30 and 7:30 p.m., respectively.

Wednesday, December 30, and Friday, January 1, will feature the four quarterfinal games. The games will take place at Vrbo Fiesta Bowl, Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic, and Rose Bowl Game Presented by Prudential.

“ESPN will broadcast CFP Quarterfinals on Friday, Jan. 1 at 4 p.m. (ABC & ESPN) and 8 p.m. (ESPN). TNT Sports will broadcast CFP Quarterfinals on Wednesday, Dec. 30, at 7:30 p.m. and Friday, Jan. 1, at noon,” the CFP official website announced.

The semifinal games will be played on Thursday, January 14, and Friday, January 15. TNT airs Thursday’s Orange Bowl semifinal. ABC and ESPN simulcast Friday’s Sugar Bowl semifinal, which is ESPN’s first CFP semifinal on ABC. On Monday, January 25, 2027, the National Championship Presented by AT&T will air across ESPN networks. The game will be played at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada.

2026-2027 broadcasting schedule compared with 2025-2026

The state of things with this schedule is very different from last year’s. First off, the national championship was played six days earlier. And with scheduling, ESPN was more protective of its broadcasting rights.

Last year, ESPN exclusively broadcast 9 of the 11 games. The only two games they sub-licensed were in the first round, as they had just one access to the rest. This year, only two games will be exclusively broadcast on ESPN. And fans have been forced to ask why they sold so much of their broadcasting rights, with rumors pointing to their budget issues and need to share the massive financial burden of their $1.3 billion annual rights fee.

The 30.1 million viewers who watched the Indiana vs Miami game made it the most-watched college football game since Jan. 2015, the second most-watched title game of the CFP era, and the No. 2 cable telecast on record. Ordinarily, this year has the potential to surpass that, being the third year of the expanded CFP format. But the impact of the broadcasting schedule on the viewership remains to be seen.

Across all 11 games, the College Football Playoff averaged 16.3 million viewers, an increase of 4% year-over-year in the second year of the expanded format. IN total, 37 billion minutes were consumed, which is also an increase of 4% year-over-year.