How Many Teams Are in the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB? A Complete Reference

The NFL has 32 teams. The NBA has 30. The NHL has 32. Major League Baseball has 30. That is 124 franchises across the four major North American leagues, and none of those numbers has changed since the Seattle Kraken arrived in 2021.

Below is every league's full conference and division structure, when each one last added a team, which are closest to expanding again, and why four leagues that grew up alongside each other landed on two different numbers.

At a Glance

Nine of those 124 major-league franchises are Canadian: seven NHL clubs, the Toronto Raptors and the Toronto Blue Jays. Add the WNBA's Toronto Tempo and three MLS clubs and the total across all six leagues reaches 13. The NFL is the only one of the six with no team outside the United States.

NFL: 32 Teams

The NFL splits evenly — two conferences of 16, four divisions of four. It is the tidiest structure in American sport, and it has been unchanged since the 2002 realignment that came with the Houston Texans.

American Football Conference

• East: Bills, Dolphins, Patriots, Jets
• North: Ravens, Bengals, Browns, Steelers
• South: Texans, Colts, Jaguars, Titans
• West: Broncos, Chiefs, Raiders, Chargers

National Football Conference

• East: Cowboys, Giants, Eagles, Commanders
• North: Bears, Lions, Packers, Vikings
• South: Falcons, Panthers, Saints, Buccaneers
• West: Cardinals, Rams, 49ers, Seahawks

Fourteen of the 32 make the playoffs. For the full title history, see List of Every Super Bowl Winner by Year.

NBA: 30 Teams

Two conferences of 15, three divisions of five each. The divisions are largely cosmetic in the NBA — playoff seeding is done conference-wide, so winning a division is worth a banner and nothing else.

Eastern Conference

• Atlantic: Celtics, Nets, Knicks, 76ers, Raptors
• Central: Bulls, Cavaliers, Pistons, Pacers, Bucks
• Southeast: Hawks, Hornets, Heat, Magic, Wizards

Western Conference

• Northwest: Nuggets, Timberwolves, Thunder, Trail Blazers, Jazz
• Pacific: Warriors, Clippers, Lakers, Suns, Kings
• Southwest: Mavericks, Rockets, Grizzlies, Pelicans, Spurs

Full detail on each market is in How Many NBA Teams Are There, and the title ledger is at List of Every NBA Champion by Year.

NHL: 32 Teams

The NHL is the only one of the four with just two divisions per conference, each holding eight teams. That structure produces the league's distinctive divisional playoff bracket, where the top three from each division qualify and two wild cards fill out the field.

Eastern Conference

• Atlantic: Bruins, Sabres, Red Wings, Panthers, Canadiens, Senators, Lightning, Maple Leafs
• Metropolitan: Hurricanes, Blue Jackets, Devils, Islanders, Rangers, Flyers, Penguins, Capitals

Western Conference

• Central: Blackhawks, Avalanche, Stars, Wild, Predators, Blues, Mammoth, Jets
• Pacific: Ducks, Flames, Oilers, Kings, Sharks, Kraken, Canucks, Golden Knights

One naming note that confuses people: the Utah Mammoth are not an expansion team. They are the former Arizona Coyotes, whose hockey operations were sold and relocated to Salt Lake City in 2024. The league count did not change. The most recent team that actually raised the number was the Kraken in 2021. Championship history is at List of Every Stanley Cup Winner by Year.

MLB: 30 Teams

Baseball calls them leagues rather than conferences, because for most of its history they genuinely were separate businesses. The American League and National League only merged into a single organization under the commissioner in 2000.

American League

• East: Orioles, Red Sox, Yankees, Rays, Blue Jays
• Central: White Sox, Guardians, Tigers, Royals, Twins
• West: Astros, Angels, Athletics, Mariners, Rangers

National League

• East: Braves, Marlins, Mets, Phillies, Nationals
• Central: Cubs, Reds, Brewers, Pirates, Cardinals
• West: Diamondbacks, Rockies, Dodgers, Padres, Giants

Two of those 30 are between permanent homes. The Athletics are playing at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento through 2027 while a Las Vegas ballpark is built for a targeted 2028 opening, and the Rays returned to a repaired Tropicana Field for 2026 after a season at George M. Steinbrenner Field. Both situations feed directly into the expansion question below.

WNBA: 15 Teams

The WNBA reached 15 for the 2026 season, its largest field ever, after the Golden State Valkyries debuted in 2025 and the Portland Fire and Toronto Tempo joined in 2026. Toronto is the league's first franchise outside the United States.

• Eastern Conference (7): Atlanta Dream, Chicago Sky, Connecticut Sun, Indiana Fever, New York Liberty, Toronto Tempo, Washington Mystics
• Western Conference (8): Dallas Wings, Golden State Valkyries, Las Vegas Aces, Los Angeles Sparks, Minnesota Lynx, Phoenix Mercury, Portland Fire, Seattle Storm

The conferences are essentially administrative. Since 2016 the WNBA has seeded its playoffs 1 through 8 by overall record with no regard to conference, and no conference championship is awarded. Team-by-team detail is in How Many WNBA Teams Are There; the title list is at List of Every WNBA Champion by Year.

The number is about to move again. The league approved franchises for Cleveland in 2028, Detroit in 2029 and Philadelphia in 2030, which will take it to 18. Separately, the Connecticut Sun were sold to Tilman Fertitta in May 2026 and will relocate to Houston for the 2027 season — a move, not an addition, so the count stays put.

MLS: 30 Teams

Major League Soccer split 30 clubs evenly between an Eastern and a Western Conference for 2026, with no divisions inside them. San Diego FC, which debuted in 2025, was the most recent addition, and 2026 was the first MLS season in more than two decades with no expansion club either playing or announced — Commissioner Don Garber paused growth at 30 until after the 2026 World Cup.

How Each League Grew to Its Current Size

All four started small and expanded in bursts, usually in response to a rival league.

The NFL played its first season in 1920 with 14 teams as the American Professional Football Association, taking its current name in 1922. It reached 26 after absorbing the AFL in the 1970 merger, then added six more between 1976 and 2002: Seattle and Tampa Bay (1976), Carolina and Jacksonville (1995), Cleveland's revived Browns (1999) and Houston (2002).

The NBA dates itself to the Basketball Association of America's founding on June 6, 1946, and took the NBA name in 1949 after merging with the National Basketball League. It shrank to eight teams by 1955, grew through the 1960s and 1970s, absorbed four ABA clubs in 1976, and reached 29 with a four-team burst in 1988–89. The 30th, the Charlotte Bobcats, arrived in 2004.

The NHL was founded in Montreal on November 26, 1917 with four teams. It sat at six from 1942 to 1967 — the "Original Six" era — then doubled overnight in 1967, absorbed four World Hockey Association clubs in 1979, and expanded steadily through the 1990s. Nashville, Atlanta, Minnesota and Columbus took it to 30 by 2000; Vegas made it 31 in 2017 and Seattle 32 in 2021.

MLB is the oldest and the slowest. The National League formed in 1876, the American League in 1901, and the pair stood at 16 teams for 52 straight seasons — 1901 to 1960 — without a single franchise moving or joining. Expansion came in five waves between 1961 and 1998, ending with Arizona and Tampa Bay.

Which League Expands Next

As of September 2026, three of the six have live processes running and none has approved anything.

The NHL is furthest along. On June 23, 2026, Commissioner Gary Bettman announced a roughly six-month evaluation of Houston and Austin as the home of a 33rd team, with the Friedkin family as the prospective owner and an investment of around $3.5 billion covering both the franchise fee and a new arena. No Board of Governors vote has been held. Houston would fill the biggest hole on the NHL's map: it is the largest US metro with no hockey team.

The NBA opened a formal study in March 2026. The Board of Governors voted to authorize the league to explore expansion into Las Vegas and Seattle, and hired investment bank PJT Partners to evaluate markets, ownership groups and arenas. Commissioner Adam Silver was careful to frame it as exploration, not approval. Seattle has been without a team since the SuperSonics left in 2008.

The WNBA is the only one with teams already sold. Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia are locked in for 2028, 2029 and 2030.

MLB has a condition, not a timeline. Commissioner Rob Manfred has repeatedly tied expansion to 32 teams to the Athletics' and Rays' stadium situations being settled first. Nashville, Salt Lake City, Charlotte and Portland are the names most often floated, but nothing is in process.

The NFL and MLS are standing still. The NFL has shown no appetite to go past 32 and has spent its energy on international games instead; MLS has paused deliberately.

Why the Counts Differ

There is no grand design behind 32 and 30 — the numbers are the residue of different histories.

The NFL and NHL both landed on 32 because 32 divides cleanly: four conferences of 16, or eight divisions of four in football, and four divisions of eight in hockey. Both leagues chased that symmetry on purpose. The NHL spent the 1990s and 2000s planting teams in Sun Belt markets with no hockey tradition specifically to get there.

The NBA and MLB stopped at 30 for opposite reasons. Basketball's ceiling is talent: with only five players on the floor and enormous single-player impact, adding teams thins the product faster than in any other sport, which is why the NBA has added exactly one franchise in the last 35 years. Baseball's ceiling is structural: a 30-team league splits into two 15-team leagues, which forces at least one interleague game every day — a scheduling headache MLB only accepted in 2013, and one reason a jump to 32 keeps getting deferred.

There is also a roster-size effect worth noting, because team count alone is a poor guide to how big a league actually is. The NFL's 32 clubs carry 53 players each on the active roster — roughly 1,700 players, more than MLB (30 teams at 26) and the NBA (30 at 15) put together. The NHL sits in between at 23 per club. A league with fewer teams is not necessarily a smaller league.

This page is reviewed whenever a league votes on expansion or a team relocates. The next confirmed change to any of these numbers is the WNBA's move to 16 in 2028.

Two companion references pick up where this one stops: Which US Cities Have Teams in All Four Major Leagues maps those 124 franchises onto the country, and Every Major US Sports Trophy and What It's Named After covers what all of them are playing for.

FAQ

How many teams are in the NFL? Thirty-two, split into two conferences of 16 and eight divisions of four. That count has held since the Houston Texans joined in 2002.

How many teams are in the NBA? Thirty, split into two conferences of 15 and six divisions of five. The last addition was the Charlotte Bobcats in 2004.

How many teams are in the NHL? Thirty-two, in two conferences of 16 and four divisions of eight. The Seattle Kraken made it 32 in 2021.

How many teams are in MLB? Thirty — 15 in the American League and 15 in the National League, three divisions of five apiece. The count has been 30 since 1998.

Which league has the most teams? The NFL and NHL are tied at 32. If you count total players rather than franchises, the NFL is far and away the largest.

How many teams are in the WNBA in 2026? Fifteen, up from 13 in 2024. Portland and Toronto debuted in 2026, and three more franchises are approved for 2028, 2029 and 2030.

Which league is most likely to expand next? The NHL, which opened a formal six-month evaluation of Houston and Austin in June 2026. The NBA is studying Las Vegas and Seattle but has approved nothing.

How many Canadian teams are in the four major leagues? Nine: seven NHL clubs, the Toronto Raptors and the Toronto Blue Jays. The NFL has none.