College football has returned, with adjustments and updates in place. Let's see what's new this season.
The 2025 college football season is set to bring a wave of excitement and challenges, as the sport steps into a new era following the historic House v. NCAA Settlement. This landmark antitrust settlement, approved in June 2025, marks the end of the amateurism ideal and transitions to a professional model in college athletics.
The key changes in the 2025 college football season include the impact of the House v. NCAA settlement, allowing NCAA Division I schools to directly pay student-athletes for their name, image, and likeness (NIL), and removing limits on scholarship amounts. This new model includes a significant increase in scholarships across NCAA sports, with football's scholarship cap raising from 85 to a roster limit of 105.
The settlement also permits new recruiting and roster management rules, allowing schools more flexibility in compensating athletes and managing team compositions. Division I schools can pay athletes an amount equivalent to about 22% of average Power Five athletic revenues, opening potentially more than $20 million in payments in year one of the agreement.
While not detailed specifically for 2025, the settlement and new rule freedoms are expected to affect transfer policies and recruiting strategies. The general evolving landscape empowers athletes with greater agency in transfers, though no explicit 2025 rule or change is described in the metadata provided.
On the field, the NCAA Rules Committee introduced new rules for 2025 to enhance player safety and game flow. These include penalties for feigning injuries, limits on timeouts during extra periods, and banning certain offensive cadences.
The College Football Playoff (CFP) structure for the 2025-26 season now guarantees a playoff spot to the five highest-ranked conference champions, and the top four teams in the final ranking by the CFP Selection Committee will receive a first-round bye.
Off the field, significant changes include FCS conference realignments and rebranding, such as the WAC becoming the United Athletic Conference and select schools moving conferences for football from 2026 onward.
The 2025 college football season is expected to be one of the most intriguing in recent memory, with the Associated Press (AP) Poll's preseason rankings revealing Texas, Ohio State, Penn State, Georgia, and Notre Dame as the top five teams. An exciting early season matchup features Texas traveling to Columbus to play Ohio State at the Big Horseshoe.
Notable personnel changes include Frank Reich, a former NFL player and coach, coaching in college football for the first time as the interim head coach at Stanford. Bill Belichick also makes his college coaching debut at the University of North Carolina, joined by Michael Lombardi as the football team's general manager.
The court decision includes back damages ordering the NCAA and power conferences to pay $2.8 billion to student-athletes who competed between 2016 and 2024. The NCAA Transfer Portal witnessed a record total of 3,400 FBS football players enter during the December and April transfer windows.
As college football returns from an offseason characterized by major shifts, both on and off the field, all stakeholders are bracing for a season filled with challenges and opportunities alike.
- The 2025 college football season, following the House v. NCAA Settlement, introduces professional models in college athletics, including the allocation of revenue for scholarships, player compensation, and online sports-analysis courses as part of education-and-self-development.
- In this new era, college football teams will use revenue sharing from the settlement to enhance learning resources and opportunities, such as providing scholarships for students pursuing online-education in sports-related fields, like football analysis.
- With Frank Reich and Bill Belichick joining college coaching for the first time in 2025, the community of educators, student-athletes, and fans can expect an exciting and competitive season, filled with both intriguing football matchups and valuable learning experiences.
