NFL Overtime Rules 2023 & History: Everything you need to know

According to the NFL Football Operations, 20 games had to be decided in overtime in the 2022 NFL regular season. Over the years, new rules have been made such as shortening the time of overtime from 15 minutes to 10 minutes and most recently, allowing both teams a chance to possess the ball.

Let's break down what overtime looks like in the NFL.

NFL overtime rules for 2023

If a game cannot be decided in the four quarters of regulation, it goes to overtime. Both teams send out their captains for a coin toss. The winner of the coin toss gets to determine if they want to possess the ball first or second OR which direction they want to go in.

Teams nearly always choose to possess the ball first because it used to be that a field goal was enough to win you the game. Now, both teams have a shot to touch the ball unless a team scores a touchdown.

In the playoffs, both teams have a chance to touch the ball even if the original team scores a touchdown.

In the regular season, if both teams either manage a field goal or don't score on their two possessions, the game continues until either someone scores or the time expires. If time runs out, the game will be declared a tie. This obviously can't happen in the playoffs though so if time expires, as many overtimes as needed will be played until a winner is declared. After four overtimes, another coin toss will take place.

Each team gets two timeouts in regular-season overtime and three timeouts in postseason overtime and there are no coaches challenges. Anything that gets reviewed will be initiated by the replay official.