Under the current NFL overtime rules, a game tied after four quarters goes to an extra period — and since the 2025 season, one thing is guaranteed in every game, regular season or playoffs: both teams get the ball. A touchdown on the opening drive no longer ends the game. The team that scores it has to kick off and defend, because the other team gets its own possession to answer.
That single sentence is where most explanations you will find online are now wrong. Pages written before 2025 — including some on big, established sports sites — still tell you the first team wins outright with an opening-drive touchdown. That rule is gone. Here are the current rules, taken from Rule 16 of the NFL rulebook and the league’s own overtime explainer, which the NFL publishes through NFL Football Operations.
NFL overtime rules: the short answer
- Regular season: one overtime period, 10 minutes maximum. Both teams must have the opportunity to possess the ball. If the score is still tied when the clock runs out, the game ends in a tie.
- Playoffs: overtime periods of 15 minutes, repeated as many times as needed. Both teams get a possession, and the game cannot end in a tie — play continues until somebody wins.
- The only way the first possession still ends the game immediately: the defense scores on it — a pick-six, a fumble returned for a touchdown, or a safety.
What Changed in 2025, and Why
For decades, NFL overtime was sudden death: first score wins, and the team that lost the coin toss might never touch the ball. In 2010 the league softened that for the playoffs, then for all games — an opening-drive field goal no longer ended it, but an opening-drive touchdown still did.
The breaking point came in the divisional round of the 2021 season’s playoffs, in January 2022. The Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs traded the lead three times in the last two minutes of regulation, tying the game 36–36. Kansas City won the coin toss, drove down the field, and scored a touchdown. Buffalo’s offense — which had just produced one of the great fourth quarters in playoff history — never got on the field. The Chiefs won 42–36, and the argument that followed was loud enough that the owners changed the rule within months: from the 2022 season, playoff overtime would guarantee both teams a possession, even after an opening touchdown.
The regular season kept the old touchdown rule for three more years. In the spring of 2025, the clubs voted to close that gap and align the two formats, as the league records in its 2025 rules changes. The rulebook entry — Rule 16, Section 1, Article 3 — now states that both teams must have the opportunity to possess the ball in regular-season overtime too, subject to the hard 10-minute limit.
One honest limit of the new system: the guarantee is an opportunity, not a completed drive. If the first team uses up most of the 10 minutes, the second team’s possession can be cut short by the clock — and if time expires during that drive with the score tied, the game is a tie anyway.
Regular-Season Overtime, Step by Step
1. The coin toss. After an intermission of no more than three minutes, the referee tosses a coin at midfield. The visiting team’s captain calls it, exactly as at the start of the game. The winner chooses whether to receive or kick, which goal to defend, or to defer the choice. Most winners take the ball — but kicking is no longer the gamble it once was, because the team that gets the ball second knows exactly what it needs.
2. One period, 10 minutes, hard stop. There is a maximum of one 10-minute period, even if the second team has not had the ball or its first possession has not finished when time expires. The two-minute warning applies, and each team gets two timeouts.
3. The first possession. Whatever the first team does — touchdown, field goal, punt, turnover on downs — the other team gets its opportunity to possess the ball. The exceptions are defensive scores: if the kicking team records a safety on the receiving team’s first possession, the kicking team wins on the spot, and a defensive touchdown ends it the same way.
4. The answer. If the first team kicked a field goal, the second team wins with a touchdown, ties it with a field goal, or loses by failing to score. If the first team scored a touchdown, the second team can tie with a touchdown of its own — or win outright there and then by scoring the touchdown and going for two.
5. Sudden death. Once both teams have had their opportunity and the score is still tied, the next score of any kind — touchdown, field goal or safety — wins the game.
6. Still tied? It’s a tie. If nobody leads when the 10 minutes are gone, the result is recorded as a tie. It counts in the standings as half a win and half a loss, and there is no second period.
One detail the highlight shows never mention: if a game ends on a touchdown, there is no conversion attempt. The try is only attempted while it can still affect the result.
Playoff Overtime, Step by Step
Playoff overtime runs on the same guarantee, but it is built to produce a winner, however long that takes.
1. The coin toss works the same way, and both teams are guaranteed an opportunity to possess the ball — an opening touchdown buys a lead, not a win.
2. Periods are 15 minutes, with a two-minute intermission between them and no halftime break after the second period. If the score is tied at the end of a period — or the second team’s first possession is still in progress — another period begins. A possession that is under way carries over; it is not wiped out by the period ending.
3. The game cannot end in a tie. Periods keep coming until there is a winner. If four full overtime periods somehow produce no winner, there is another coin toss and play continues. The same end-of-half timing rules that apply at the end of the second and fourth quarters also apply at the end of a second or fourth overtime period.
4. Timeouts reset by the “half.” Each team gets three timeouts per half of overtime — the first two periods count as one half, the next two as the next.
5. The captain who lost the first coin toss gets the choice of possession or goal at the start of the following stretch of play, unless the toss winner deferred — the same pattern as a normal game’s opening toss.
The first real test of the playoff format came in Super Bowl LVIII in February 2024. San Francisco won the toss, took the ball, and kicked a field goal. Under the pre-2022 rules that would still have given Kansas City a possession, so the new guarantee was not what saved the Chiefs — what decided the game was that Patrick Mahomes drove 75 yards and ended it with a touchdown pass, winning 25–22. Several 49ers players admitted afterwards that they had not fully known the new rules, which tells you how recently — and how confusingly — this format has been rebuilt.
Regular Season vs Playoffs: The Full Comparison
| Rule | Regular season | Playoffs |
|---|---|---|
| Period length | 10 minutes | 15 minutes per period |
| Number of periods | One, maximum | Unlimited, until there is a winner |
| Both teams get a possession? | Yes — guaranteed opportunity since 2025 | Yes — guaranteed since the 2022 season |
| Can the game end in a tie? | Yes, if still level after 10 minutes | No — play continues |
| Opening-drive touchdown | Does not end the game; the other team gets its possession | Does not end the game; the other team gets its possession |
| What ends it on the first possession | Only a defensive score (safety, pick-six, fumble-return TD) | Only a defensive score |
| After both possessions, still tied | Next score wins — inside the same 10 minutes | Next score wins; new periods keep coming |
| Timeouts | 2 per team | 3 per team per half of overtime |
| Two-minute warning | Yes | End-of-half timing rules apply at the end of the 2nd and 4th periods |
| Breaks | Max 3 minutes before OT starts | 2 minutes between periods; no halftime after the 2nd period |
| Coach’s replay challenges | None — the replay official initiates all reviews | None — the replay official initiates all reviews |
Details Most Guides Leave Out
- The 10 minutes is a wall, not a guideline. In the regular season the period is never extended so the second team can finish — or even start — its possession. A long, slow opening drive is now a genuine strategy: score late enough, and the answer has to come against the clock as well as the defense.
- Going for two is the aggressive finish. A second team that matches a touchdown can kick the extra point to keep playing, or go for two and win or lose on one play. Coaches who trust their offense are increasingly tempted, because giving the ball back means sudden death.
- No coach’s challenges. In all overtime, coaches cannot challenge. Every review is initiated by the replay official.
- A tie is a real result. It feels like a glitch to fans raised on playoff football, but regular-season ties have stood in the standings for decades, and the 2025 change did nothing to remove them.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can a regular-season NFL game still end in a tie? Yes. If the score is level when the single 10-minute overtime period ends, the game is recorded as a tie. Playoff games cannot end in a tie — periods repeat until there is a winner.
Who gets the ball first in overtime? Whoever wins the coin toss decides. The referee tosses the coin after a break of up to three minutes, the visiting captain calls it, and the winning team can receive, kick, choose a goal to defend, or defer. Because both teams are now guaranteed a possession, taking the ball second — and knowing exactly what you need — has become a real strategic option rather than a mistake.
What happens if the first team scores a touchdown now? The game continues. The touchdown counts, the conversion is attempted because it can still matter, and the scoring team kicks off. The other team gets its possession and can tie with a touchdown and a kick, win with a touchdown and a two-point conversion, or lose by not scoring. This is the 2025 change, and it is the point most older guides get wrong.
Can the second team win on its first possession? Yes. If the first team kicked a field goal, a touchdown wins it. If the first team scored a touchdown, a touchdown plus a two-point conversion wins it. If the second team only matches the score, the game moves to sudden death — next score wins.
How many timeouts does each team get in overtime? Two per team in the regular season. In the playoffs, three per team for each “half” of overtime — the first two periods forming one half, the next two the second.
How long can a playoff overtime last? As long as it needs to. Periods of 15 minutes repeat until a winner emerges, with a fresh coin toss if four periods pass without one. There is no tie and no point at which the game is called off.
Is there overtime in preseason games? No — and this one surprises people, because there used to be. The clubs amended Rule 16 in 2021 to eliminate preseason overtime altogether. A preseason game that is tied after four quarters simply ends as a tie, with no extra period at all. The reasoning was plain: exhibition games do not affect the standings, and extra snaps were an injury risk nobody needed.
Is college football overtime the same? No. College overtime uses alternating possessions from the opponent’s 25-yard line, with no game clock deciding possessions, and later periods shrink to two-point-conversion shootouts. The NFL keeps a real clock, kickoffs, and full-field football — the two systems share a name and almost nothing else. Duration questions differ just as much across sports; compare how long a soccer game is if you want the other extreme, where extra time and penalties follow entirely different logic.
More sports rules, explained the same way: pickleball rules and the F1 points system.
Rules checked against the NFL’s official overtime page and the current NFL rulebook (Rule 16), published by NFL Football Operations, November 2026.