The College Football Playoff will not expand beyond 12 teams for the 2026 season.

Friday marked the deadline for the CFP management committee—the 10 FBS commissioners and Notre Dame AD Pete Bevacqua—to inform ESPN of any changes to next season’s format. 

“After ongoing discussion about the 12-team playoff format, the decision was made to continue with the current structure,” said CFP executive director Rich Clark in a statement. “This will give the Management Committee additional time to review the 12-team format, so they can better assess the need for potential change. While they all agree the current format has brought more excitement to college football and has given more schools a real shot in the postseason, another year of evaluation will be helpful.”

The committee met Sunday in Miami, but ultimately Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti and the SEC’s Greg Sankey, who together must agree on any changes to the CFP, were unable to find common ground.

The SEC continues to prefer a 16-team format with five automatic qualifiers and 11 at-large bids determined by the CFP selection committee. The Big Ten is in favor of an even larger field, potentially up to 24 teams, and multiple automatic bids for top conferences.

While the 2026 CFP will remain at 12 teams, expansion discussions are expected to continue. Under the current CFP contract, Dec. 1 is the annual deadline to inform ESPN of any changes to the next season’s structure, so leaders will have at least the next 10 months to explore more ideas. This year’s deadline was pushed back by nearly two months in an ultimately unsuccessful effort to find a solution for expansion in 2026.

There are other significant changes coming to the CFP this year, though.

Instead of the five highest-ranked conference champions receiving automatic CFP bids as in the past two years, new rules will give the champions of the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, and SEC automatic CFP bids, regardless of their rankings. The highest-ranked Group of 6 conference champion will also get an automatic bid. If Notre Dame is ranked inside the top 12, it will also receive an automatic bid, which could potentially push out a higher-ranked at-large team.

The CFP is also ending its performance-based revenue-distribution model that saw Miami this season and Notre Dame last season each rake in $20 million in bonus money, in addition to big conference-wide payouts. Moving forward, the Big Ten and SEC will earn roughly 29% of CFP revenue each, the ACC 17%, the Big 12 15%, and the Group of 6 conferences collectively 10%.

The UFC on Paramount+ era starts Saturday, but how it affects fighters’ wallets still remains to be determined.

UFC will take in an average of $1.1 billion per year from the Paramount deal, doubling the amount the promotion earned from its media agreement with ESPN. UFC CEO Dana White previously told Front Office Sports that the deal is “incredible for the fighters” and would result in the company looking into increasing fighter pay.

UFC fighters typically compete on show-and-win contracts, with fighters having guaranteed pay for fighting and a bonus for winning. But champions and stars have historically also earned a share of pay-per-view revenue. With pay-per-view largely eliminated, some fighters will be losing a key chunk of their pay.

Knock Out Representation president Oren Hodak told FOS that he is renegotiating contracts to reflect the post-PPV reality.

“We are currently working on a new flat rate for some fighters who would have previously earned pay-per-view points,” Hodak told FOS. Hodak represents former champions Aljamain Sterling and Merab Dvalishvili, along with fan favorites like Kevin Holland and Renato Moicano.

As UFC’s revenue continues to increase, Hodak believes that fighters should indeed be paid more. “I certainly feel that our clients are entitled to a fair piece of the pie,” he told FOS. “I will be presenting our case for these increased earnings and working on new deals for upcoming bouts.”

Multiple fighters have chimed in on how their contract situation has been affected by the Paramount deal, including Conor McGregor. The Irish lightweight has not fought an MMA bout since July 2021, but White has said that he is under consideration to fight on the card that is planned for Trump’s birthday in Washington, D.C., this summer. McGregor appeared on a livestream Sunday and said that due to the deal, he has to renegotiate his contract to fight on the White House card. 

“My contract, essentially, is void right now because there’s no more pay-per-view, whereas my contract was based on pay-per-view sales,” McGregor said. He added that negotiations will begin in February and that he is “very interested to see how it goes.”

The latest fighter to comment was Justin Gaethje, who is fighting in the main event of UFC 324 on Jan. 24. Gaethje spoke at media day on Wednesday and disputed the notion that the deal is already financially benefiting the fighters. 

“I hear Daniel Cormier saying that everybody is going to get paid more on this card,” Gaethje said. “I’m not getting one dollar more than I would’ve if this deal didn’t happen.”

White appeared on The Pat McAfee Show on Thursday and disputed Gaethje’s version. “Gaethje was offered more money and Gaethje never responded,” he said. 

UFC and Gaethje’s agency Dominance MMA could not be reached for comment.