NEW YORK — The WNBA will tip off its 2026 regular season on May 8, assuming the league and the players’ union can come to an agreement on a new collective bargaining agreement.
Teams will play 44 games over a five-month period with a 17-day break for the FIBA World Cup in early September. League representatives said last year that with the World Cup this season, they would keep the schedule at 44 games despite adding two new teams via expansion with the Portland Fire and the Toronto Tempo.
“As we prepare to tip off the WNBA’s historic 30th season, this schedule reflects both how far the league has come and the momentum that continues to drive us forward,” WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in a league release Wednesday.
“From welcoming two new organizations in Toronto and Portland, to honoring our history with marquee matchups that connect the league’s first game to today’s stars, the 2026 season will celebrate the WNBA’s past, present, and future. With a record number of games, growing global reach, and unprecedented momentum, this milestone season will help define the next chapter of the WNBA.”
By putting the schedule out now, teams can start selling ticket packages, book travel for away games — including charter flights — and secure arena dates.
All but two teams have at least one back-to-back set of games. Overall, the average of games on consecutive nights is down from 2.4 per team in 2025 to 1.6 this year.
The WNBA hopes to expand the number of games teams play in future years, but that would come in a new CBA.
Training camp is slated to begin April 19, six days after the first-year player draft.
All 15 teams will play opening weekend, highlighted by a WNBA Finals rematch between the Las Vegas Aces — who last season won their third title in a four-year stretch — and the Phoenix Mercury as well as a matchup of the past two No. 1 draft picks, with guard Paige Bueckers and the Dallas Wings visiting the Indiana Fever and guard Caitlin Clark.
The Los Angeles Sparks will host the New York Liberty on June 21, the anniversary of the original matchup between the teams that was the first game in league history.
The league will also have its sixth annual Commissioner’s Cup games in June, with the championship contest of that in-season tournament slated to take place on June 30. The WNBA All-Star Game is set for July 25 in Chicago, with regular-season games to resume three days later.
The WNBA will go on break from Aug. 31 to Sept. 16 for the World Cup, which will be played in Berlin this year. Teams will have a handful of regular-season games after that tournament finishes, with the playoffs set to begin Sept. 27.
All of this is still contingent on the league and union coming to an agreement on a new CBA. The last CBA was announced in the middle of January 2020, a month after it had been agreed to. It could easily take two months from when a new CBA is reached to get to the start of free agency.
The two sides agreed to a moratorium on free agency, which was supposed to begin earlier this month. The moratorium was needed after no new extension was reached on Jan. 9 to negotiate a new CBA. The WNBA and union are now in a “status quo” period where the old CBA is still in effect and the two parties are negotiating in good faith.
Besides free agency, the WNBA also still has to hold an expansion draft for Portland and Toronto.