The NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), also known as Division I-A, is the highest level of college football in the United States. The FBS consists of the largest schools in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). As of the 2025 season, there are 10 conferences and 138 schools in FBS.

College football is one of the most popular spectator sports throughout much of the United States. The top schools generate tens of millions of dollars in yearly revenue. Top FBS teams draw tens of thousands of fans to games, and the fifteen largest American stadiums by capacity all host FBS teams or games. Since July 1, 2021, college athletes have been able to receive payments for the use of their name, image, and likeness. Prior to this date colleges were only allowed to provide players with non-monetary compensation such as athletic scholarships that provide for tuition, housing, and books.

Unlike other NCAA divisions and subdivisions, the NCAA does not officially award an FBS football national championship, nor does it host a playoff tournament to determine such a champion on the field. As the College Football Playoff did not exist until 2014, organizations such as the Associated Press and AFCA have historically sought to rank the teams and crown a national champion, by taking a vote of sports writers and coaches, respectively. Various cities across the United States have created their own postseason contests, called bowl games, in which they traditionally invite teams to participate. Historically, these bowl games were mostly considered to be exhibition games involving a payout to participating teams. However, in the modern era, some of the bowls serve as quarterfinal or semifinal games of the Playoff and the remainder constitute the de facto postseason for teams that fail to qualify for the Playoff. The decades preceding the advent of the Playoff also included attempts by the premier FBS conferences and bowl games to attempt to organize matchups so that the FBS national championship was decided on the field, such as the Bowl Coalition from 1992 to 1994, the Bowl Alliance from 1995 to 1997, and the Bowl Championship Series from 1998 to 2013.

Overview

The FBS is the highest level of college football in the United States, and former FBS players make up the vast majority of the players picked in the NFL Draft and active roster members. For every sport, the NCAA divides schools into three major divisions: Divisions I, II, and III. However, in football, Division I is further divided into two sub-divisions: the Bowl Subdivision, abbreviated as the FBS, and the Championship Subdivision, abbreviated as the FCS. Divisions are themselves further divided up into conferences, which are groupings of schools that play each other in contention for a conference championship. The FBS currently has ten conferences, which are often divided into the "Power Four conferences" – which consist of the most prestigious schools and enjoy a certain amount of autonomy from NCAA rules – and the less prominent "Group of Six".

Although FCS programs can draw thousands of fans per game, many FCS schools attempt to join the FBS in hopes of increased revenue, corporate sponsorship, alumni donations, prestige, and national exposure. However, FBS programs also face increased expenses in regards to staff salaries, facility improvements, and scholarships. The athletic departments of many FBS schools lose money every year, and these athletic departments must rely on subsidies from the rest of the university. In many states, the highest-paid public employee is the head coach of an FBS team. Before the settlement of the House v. NCAA legal case took full effect in 2025–26, FBS schools were limited to a total of 85 football players receiving financial assistance. Since then, FBS programs have had a hard roster limit of 105, but all rostered players may receive full scholarships. Nearly all FBS schools that are not on NCAA probation give the full allowed scholarship allotment. The three United States service academies that are FBS members were technically subject to the 85-scholarship limit before House, but were effectively exempt because all of their students receive federally-funded full scholarships whether or not they play a varsity sport.

In order to retain FBS membership, schools must meet several requirements. Before 2023, FBS schools had to average at least 15,000 home attendance (over a rolling two-year period). An FBS school must sponsor a minimum of 16 varsity intercollegiate teams (including football), with at least six men's or coeducational teams and at least eight all-female teams. Across all sports, each FBS school must offer at least 200 athletic scholarships (or spend at least $4 million on athletic scholarships) per year, and FBS football teams must provide at least 90% of the maximum number of football scholarships (which is currently 85).

In October 2023, the NCAA announced major changes to FBS membership requirements. The average home attendance requirement, which had largely gone unenforced in the 21st century and was suspended in 2020 due to COVID-19 impacts, was permanently eliminated, effective immediately. Effective in 2027–28, minimums on both the total number of, and spending on, athletic scholarships in all FBS programs will be enforced. The number of required athletic scholarships will increase to 210, and the annual spending requirement rises to $6 million. Also starting in 2027–28, FBS programs must not only provide at least 90% of the required number of football scholarships, but must provide at least 90% of the maximum number of scholarships across a total of 16 sports, including football.

Scheduling

The FBS season begins in late August or early September and ends in mid-January with the College Football Playoff National Championship game. Most FBS teams play 12 regular season games per year, with eight or nine of those games coming against conference opponents. All 10 FBS conferences hold a conference championship game to determine the winner of the conference.

+ New Year's Six Bowls Bowl Location Est. Rose Bowl Pasadena, CA 1902 Orange Bowl Miami Gardens, FL 1935 Sugar Bowl New Orleans, LA 1935 Cotton Bowl Arlington, TX 1937 Peach Bowl Atlanta, GA 1968 Fiesta Bowl Glendale, AZ 1971

Following the conference championship games, 12 teams are selected to compete in the College Football Playoff, while other eligible teams are invited to bowl games. The top four seeds in the playoff receive a first-round bye, while the remaining eight teams compete in first-round games on campus sites. After the first round, the eight remaining playoff teams compete in the New Year's Six bowls, which rotate the responsibility of hosting quarterfinal and semifinal playoff games. The playoff culminates in the College Football Playoff National Championship.

The Hawaii Rainbow Warriors and teams that play at HawaiiNCAA 2016, "Bylaw 17.10.5.2.1(g) Bowl Subdivision, Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico", p. 248. get a special exemption and are allowed to play an extra regular season game in order to defray travel costs. Therefore, the longest possible FBS schedule is 18 games: 13 in the regular season, a conference championship game, and four playoff games.

For non-conference regular season games, FBS teams are free to schedule matchups against any other FBS team, regardless of conference. A small number of FBS teams are independent and have total control over their own schedule. Non-conference games are scheduled by mutual agreement and often involve "home and homes" (where teams alternate as hosts) and long-established rivalries. In order to balance out the difficulty of their in-conference schedules, teams from the stronger conferences frequently play non-conference games against teams from the weaker conferences or, occasionally, against FCS teams. FBS teams are free to schedule up to 40% of their games against FCS teams, but FBS teams can only use one win per season against an FCS team for the purposes of bowl eligibility. Additionally, the FCS opponent must have averaged at least 80% of the FCS limit of 63 scholarship equivalents over a rolling two-year period. (Before the 2022 season, this limit had been 90%.NCAA 2016, "Bylaw 18.7.2.2.1 Exception – Football Championship Subdivision Opponent", p. 302.) An FBS team must schedule a total of five home games per year; for the purposes of scheduling, a "home game" must take place at a venue in which the team plays 50% of its "home games", although a team is allowed to count one neutral-site game against an FBS team toward the "home game" requirement.NCAA 2016, "Bylaw 20.9.9.2 Football Scheduling Requirement (FBS)", p. 344. FBS–FCS games, known as "money games", are often home games for the FBS team, and victories by FCS teams are considered to be upsets. FCS teams receive hundreds of thousands of dollars for their participation in these games.

+ Number of bowl games Year Bowls Teams in bowlsThe percentage of FBS teams in bowl games 1968 10 ~17% 1984 18 ~34% 1997 20 ~35% 2015 41 62.5% 2024 46 ~61%

The Football Bowl Subdivision gets its name from the bowl games that many FBS teams play at the end of the year, although other college divisions also have their own bowl games. FBS bowl games are played at the end of the season in December or January. During the 2024–25 bowl season, there were 46 FBS bowl games, including four first-round College Football Playoff games and the College Football Playoff National Championship. An FBS team typically must have a record of 6–6 or better in order to be bowl eligible. In certain cases – usually if not enough teams have such records – 5–7 and 6–7 teams can also be selected to bowls.

Many bowls have one or more conference tie-ins; for example, the Pop-Tarts Bowl provides a matchup between teams from ACC and the Big 12. A small number of long-established bowls played a major role in the Bowl Championship Series, which was used to select the national champion until the 2013 season, and these bowls continue to play a major role in the College Football Playoff. In addition to payouts to participating teams, conferences receive millions of dollars for each school that appears in the playoff. Appearances in other bowls are also quite lucrative. In addition to the regular bowls, some postseason games, such as the Senior Bowl, match up teams of all-stars and NFL draft entrants.

History

College football has been played for over one hundred years, but the game and the organizational structure of college football have evolved significantly during that time. The first college football game was played in 1869, but the game continued to develop during the late 19th and early 20th century. During this period, Walter Camp pioneered the concept of a line of scrimmage, the system of downs, and the College Football All-America Team. The 1902 Rose Bowl was the first bowl game in college football history, and the event began to be held annually starting with the 1916 Rose Bowl. In the 1930s, other bowl games came into existence, including the Sugar Bowl, the Cotton Bowl Classic, and the Orange Bowl. The 1906 college football season was the first season played under the IAAUS (which would later change its name to the NCAA) and the first season in which the forward pass was legal. The IAAUS had formed after President Theodore Roosevelt, responding to several deaths that had occurred during football games, requested that colleges find ways to make football a safer sport.