How does the NBA work and when does the season start?

The 2026-27 National Basketball Association (NBA) season starts Tuesday, 20 October with the Boston Celtics heading to the Detroit Pistons.

The regular season, as well as the in-season NBA Cup, takes place between October and April.

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After that, the play-offs take place to determine the NBA champions, who are crowned in June.

What is the format?

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander of Oklahoma City Thunder has won each of the last two NBA regular season Most Valuable Player (MVP) awards [Getty Images]

All 30 teams are evenly split into two conferences of 15 – creating the Eastern Conference and the Western Conference.

Each team plays 82 regular season matches between October and April, with the top six teams from each conference qualifying directly into the NBA play-offs.

The teams between seventh and 10th enter the play-in tournament, where two more play-offs spots from each conference are up for grabs.

There are also three divisions in each conference, with teams playing every other team in their division four times in the regular season.

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Teams will then play six of the other sides in their conference four times, while taking on the remaining four franchises three times. They will then face all 15 teams in their opposing conference twice.

While the regular season sees teams play against opposition in both the Eastern and Western Conferences, the play-offs are conference-specific. All rounds of the play-offs are played in a best of seven-match series.

The winner of the Eastern Conference will face the winner of the Western Conference in the NBA finals in June, with the winner being crowned NBA champions.

List of NBA teams

Eastern Conference:

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Atlantic Division

Central Division

Southeast Division

Western Conference:

Northwest Division

Pacific Division

Southwest Division

What is the NBA Cup and when does it start?

The New York Knicks also won the NBA Cup last season [Getty Images]

The NBA Cup is an in-season competition where teams compete for a trophy, but some results also count towards the overall season standings.

The event starts on Friday, October 30, with the final taking place on Friday, December…

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Publish date : 2026-10-20 10:42:00

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