Power Five conferences

The ten current FBS conferences are listed below. For the Power Five, the member universities of each conference are also listed.

  Members departing for the Big Ten in 2024.
  Members departing for the Big 12 in 2024.
  Members departing for the ACC in 2024.
  Members departing for the SEC in 2024.

* The University of Notre Dame is a full voting member of the ACC, and although its football team does not participate in ACC football and competes as a football independent, it is obligated to play an average of five football games a year against ACC opponents.[7] In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Notre Dame entered into a full ACC football schedule and was eligible for the conference's championship.[8] Notre Dame fields 24 other varsity sports that compete in the ACC, as well as men's ice hockey which competes in the Big Ten Conference.

Map of current teams

Notre Dame

Arizona

Arizona State

California

UCLA

Oregon

Oregon State

USC

Stanford

Washington

Washington State

Colorado

Utah

Texas A&M

Arkansas

Florida

Kentucky

Georgia

Tennessee

Vanderbilt

Alabama

Auburn

LSU

Ole Miss

Mississippi State

Missouri

South Carolina

Penn State

Rutgers

Nebraska

Indiana

Michigan

Michigan State

Ohio State

Illinois

Iowa

Minnesota

Northwestern

Purdue

Wisconsin

Maryland

BYU

Cincinnati

Houston

Iowa State

Kansas

Kansas State

Oklahoma

Oklahoma State

Texas Tech

Texas

Baylor

TCU

UCF

West
Virginia

Georgia Tech

Wake
Forest

Virginia

NC State

North
Carolina

Duke

Clemson

Boston College

Syracuse

Pittsburgh

Miami (FL)

Virginia Tech

Florida State

Louisville

Teams for each of the Power Five Conferences during the 2023 season.
SEC
ACC
Big Ten
Big 12
Big 12 - Departing for SEC
Pac-12
Pac-12 - Departing for Big Ten
Pac-12 - Departing for Big 12
Pac-12 - Departing for ACC
Power Five independent

With the establishment of the College Football Playoff in 2014, the term "automatic qualifying conference" is no longer in use, as the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) has been discontinued. However, five of the six former AQ conferences are now known as the "Power Five conferences": the Big Ten Conference, the Big 12 Conference, the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), the Pac-12 Conference, and the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The sixth AQ conference, the Big East, was split up during the 2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, with five members joining P5 conferences, Notre Dame establishing a relationship with the ACC, the remaining non-football members forming the new Big East Conference, and the remaining members forming the American Athletic Conference. It is unknown where the term "Power Five Conference" originated from; it is not officially documented anywhere by the NCAA.

The American, as well as Conference USA (C-USA), the Mid-American Conference (MAC), the Mountain West Conference (MW), and the Sun Belt Conference are known as the "Group of Five" (sometimes called the G5).

The FBS also has four independent schools as of the upcoming 2023 season: Notre Dame, Army, UConn, and UMass. Three former independents became full members of FBS conferences in 2023; BYU joined the Big 12,[9] and Liberty and New Mexico State joined C-USA.[10] Notre Dame is currently considered equal to the Power Five schools, being a full (with the exception of football) member of the ACC with an annual five-game football scheduling agreement with that conference; Notre Dame also has its own national television contract and its own arrangement for access to the CFP-affiliated bowl games should it meet stated competitive criteria. All Power Five leagues that require their members to schedule at least one Power Five team in nonconference play (currently the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC, and Pac-12) consider Notre Dame to be a Power Five opponent for such purposes. Before BYU joined the Big 12, the ACC, Big Ten, and SEC also counted it as a Power Five opponent for scheduling purposes, and the Big Ten and SEC continue to count Army as such.[11][12][13]

Teams from the Power Five and the Group of Five play each other during the season, and sometimes also play against FCS teams. However, many coaches of Power Five schools have argued that Power Five schools should only be allowed to schedule games against other Power Five schools.[4] In 2014, the NCAA gave the Power Five conferences greater autonomy in regard to issues such as stipends and recruiting rules.[14] Some Power Five conferences, including the Big Ten and SEC, require their teams to play at least one non-conference P5 opponent each season.[13][12]

The College Football Playoff rotates among six bowl games, with two bowl games used as each year as the national semi-finals, and four other bowls matching the remaining top teams in the country. These six bowl games are collectively known as the "New Year's Six" bowl games. Conference champions from the Power Five are not guaranteed a spot in the playoffs, and at least one will always be left out of the playoffs. While no rule makes Group of Five teams ineligible for the playoffs, no such team was ranked higher than #8 in the final CFP rankings (UCF in 2018) until Cincinnati was #4 in 2021; selectors regularly claim these teams typically have weaker schedules. The aforementioned 2021 Cincinnati team was the first Group of Five team to ever be ranked in the top four by the committee at any point during the season. However, Cincinnati along with the aforementioned UCF and Houston joined the Big 12, thereby becoming Power 5 programs.[15]

Through the 2023 season, each conference champion from the Power Five and the highest-ranked Group of Five conference champion is guaranteed a spot in a New Year's Six Bowl.[16] Every year, a non-Power Five team is guaranteed one bid to the New Year's Six bowls; however, so far no additional bids beyond that one have been granted.

The FBS has undergone several waves of realignment since the 1990s, when the Bowl Coalition was established. The first realignment occurred in the 1990s, and resulted in the demise of the Southwest Conference, which was a member of the Bowl Coalition and at times considered equal to some of the Power Five conferences; as well as many schools giving up independent status to join conferences. In the early 1990s, Arkansas left the Southwest Conference for the SEC; the original Big East Conference began sponsoring football, with eight former football independents joining either for all sports or football only; and other major independents such as Florida State (to the ACC), Penn State (to the Big Ten), and South Carolina (to the SEC) joined major conferences. In the 1996 NCAA conference realignment, the SWC dissolved, and four Texas teams from that conference joined with the Big 8 schools to form the Big 12 Conference.

During another phase of realignment in 2005, three schools (Boston College, Miami-FL and Virginia Tech) jumped from the Big East to the ACC, and Temple also left the conference (before eventually returning in 2013). The Big East responded by adding former basketball-only member Connecticut and three schools from C-USA.[22]

College football underwent another major conference realignment from 2010 to 2014, as the Big Ten and Pac-10 sought to become large enough to stage championship games. Members of the original Big East left the conference to join the Big 12, Big Ten, and ACC. The Big 12 lost members to the SEC, the Pac-12, and the Big Ten, while the Big Ten also gained one former ACC member. The remaining members of the Big East split into two conferences: the American Athletic Conference (the American) and a new Big East Conference that does not sponsor football (only three of the original 10 members of the current Big East sponsor football, all at the second-tier Division I FCS level). The American, the football successor to the Big East, is no longer considered a power conference. Despite the major conference realignment from 2010 to 2014, relatively few schools dropped out of or joined the ranks of the power conferences. Two of the three non-AQ schools that had appeared in multiple BCS bowls left the Mountain West Conference and joined a power conference, as Utah joined the Pac-12 and TCU joined the Big 12. Former Big East members Temple, Cincinnati, and South Florida are all now part of The American; another former Big East member, UConn, left American Conference football after the 2019 season to become an FBS independent while otherwise joining the current Big East. Of these, only Temple was a founding member of the Big East in football.[22][23]

The most recent major realignment is currently ongoing. During a period of less than two months in 2021, the Big 12 both gained and lost members. First, on July 30, the conference lost two of its mainstays when Oklahoma and Texas announced that they would leave for the SEC no later than 2025;[24] the two schools later reached a buyout agreement that will allow them to join the SEC in 2024.[25] The Big 12 reloaded by announcing four new members on September 10, initially announcing that American members Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF plus FBS independent BYU would join no later than 2024.[9] BYU's initial announcement stated that it would join in 2023,[26] and the other three schools' 2023 entry date was officially confirmed after they reached a buyout agreement with The American.[27] On June 30, 2022, Pac-12 mainstays UCLA and USC announced they would move to the Big Ten in 2024.[28] The Pac-12 would lose another member a little more than a year later when Colorado announced it would return to the Big 12 in 2024 after an absence of 13 years.[29] A further five schools announced their departure from the Pac-12 on August 4, 2023; Oregon and Washington would join the Big Ten and Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah would join the Big 12.[30][31] Less than a month after this exodus, California and Stanford announced their departure from the Pac-12 to join the ACC in 2024, with American Conference member SMU also joining the ACC at that time.[32]

At present, seven of the nine former members of the Southwest Conference are in Power Five conferences: Arkansas and Texas A&M are members of the SEC, while TCU, Houston, Baylor, Texas, and Texas Tech are members of the Big 12. SMU and Rice are members of The American, with SMU set to join the ACC in 2024.

From 1998 to 2013, the top teams in Division I FBS played in the BCS. It consisted of four or five bowl games, with a national championship game either rotating among the bowl sites (prior to the 2006 season) or played as a separate game. The BCS succeeded two other systems that were put in place after the 1991 season in order to ensure that one national champion could be crowned at the end of the season. The original Bowl Coalition consisted of the SEC, the Big Eight Conference (later succeeded by the Big 12), the Southwest Conference (SWC), the ACC, the Big East, and Notre Dame. The BCS added the Pac-10 (now known as the Pac-12) and the Big Ten, while the SWC dissolved in 1996. In 2013, the Big East split into two conferences, and its successor, the American Athletic Conference (The American), took the Big East's place for the 2013 season.

In addition to creating a national championship game, the BCS also created a set format for other major bowls. After the two top teams in the BCS rankings were matched up in the BCS National Championship Game, the other three or (after the 2005 season) four bowls selected other top teams. The term "BCS conference" was used by many fans to refer to one of the six conferences whose champions received an automatic berth in one of the five BCS bowl games, although the BCS itself used the term "automatic qualifying conference" (AQ conference).[33] While the number of AQ conferences was technically variable,[34] the BCS always had six AQ conferences since its inception in 1998. The Mountain West Conference (MW) was perhaps the closest of the other conferences to getting AQ status, but its request for AQ status was denied in 2012.[35] Each of the bowls had a historical link with one or more of the six BCS conferences with the exception of the former Big East, and the bowl games selected a team from each of these conferences if it was eligible for a BCS bowl and not playing in the national title game. The conferences included in this group, with their traditional bowl links, were:

• Big East Conference (The American in 2013) (not tied to any specific BCS bowl)
• Atlantic Coast Conference (Orange Bowl)
• Big 12 Conference (Fiesta Bowl)
• Big Ten Conference (Rose Bowl)
• Pac-12 Conference (Rose Bowl)
• Southeastern Conference (Sugar Bowl)

Notre Dame is an independent in football, but was a founding member[36] of the BCS.[37] Because of the "Notre Dame rule", it had guaranteed access to the BCS bowls when it met certain defined performance criteria.[38]

Map of automatic qualifying conference schools in 2013
A map of every university in the automatic qualifying conferences in 2013.

The other five conferences (listed below) were non-AQ conferences because they did not receive an annual automatic bid to a BCS bowl game. The highest ranked champion of any non-AQ conference received an AQ bid if they ranked in the top 12 of the final BCS poll or ranked in the top 16 and higher than a champion of an AQ conference.[39]

The conferences in this group were:[40]

• Conference USA (C-USA)
• Mid-American Conference (MAC)
• Mountain West Conference (MW)
• Sun Belt Conference
• Western Athletic Conference (WAC) – dropped football after the 2012 season, following a near-complete membership turnover that saw the league stripped of all but two of its football-sponsoring schools. The conference would reinstate football in 2021, but as part of the second-tier Division I FCS.

Ten "non-AQ" teams appeared in the nine following BCS games, with an overall record of 5-3:

• 2005 Fiesta Bowl: Utah (MW) 35, Pittsburgh 7
• 2007 Fiesta Bowl: Boise State (WAC) 43, Oklahoma 42 (OT)
• 2008 Sugar Bowl: Georgia 41, Hawaiʻi (WAC) 10
• 2009 Sugar Bowl: Utah (MW) 31, Alabama 17
• 2010 Fiesta Bowl: Boise State (WAC) 17, TCU (MW) 10
• 2011 Rose Bowl: TCU (MW) 21, Wisconsin 19
• 2013 Orange Bowl: Florida State 31, Northern Illinois (MAC) 10

Of these appearances, all were via automatic qualifying bids, except Boise State's participation in the highly controversial 2010 Fiesta Bowl in which the Broncos were selected via at-large bid and played fellow BCS Buster TCU.

The following table lists the number of times that a member of each conference appeared in a New Year's Six bowl game or a BCS bowl game. For the 1998 to 2005 seasons there were four such games, from 2006 to 2013 there were five such games. Starting in 2014 there are six CFP associated bowl games (not including the national championship game) known as the New Year's Six. A * indicates a team from that conference won the national championship, while a ^ indicates a team from that conference was the runner-up in the national championship game.

Statistics reflect conference membership at the time of the game. Note that the American filled the Big East's automatic bid in 2013.

The Power Five conferences sponsor other sports in addition to football.

Numbers in italics denote special exceptions:

Football:

• ACC: Notre Dame is an independent and not an ACC member in the sport.

Men's Soccer:

• Big 12: The only current conference members that sponsor men's soccer, UCF and West Virginia, play in the Sun Belt Conference (SBC). None of the schools joining in 2024 sponsor the sport.
• Pac-12: Five of the conference's 12 full members sponsor men's soccer. They are joined by single-sport member San Diego State, otherwise a member of the Mountain West Conference (MW). Four of the 10 schools leaving the Pac-12 in 2024 sponsor men's soccer: California, Stanford, UCLA, and Washington.
• SEC: Only two members, Kentucky and South Carolina, sponsor soccer for men. Since the 2022 season, both have housed these teams in the SBC, and their rivalry is the SEC Derby.

Men's Ice Hockey:

• ACC: Boston College plays in Hockey East. Notre Dame plays in the Big Ten Conference, but its membership is listed in italics as belonging to the ACC, its home conference for other sports.
• Big 12: No current member sponsors the sport for either men or women..Arizona State, which joins the Big 12 in 2024, will join the single-sport National Collegiate Hockey Conference at the same time.
• Big Ten: The count of six Big Ten schools includes only full conference members. Notre Dame is listed in its home conference of the ACC.
• Pac-12: Arizona State will compete as an independent in 2023–24, its last season as a full member of the Pac-12.

Men's Lacrosse:

• Big 12: As a Pac-12 member, future Big 12 member Utah became the first Pac-12 school, and also the first Division I school west of the Continental Divide, to sponsor men's lacrosse as a varsity sport, launching its team in the 2018–19 school year (2019 season). Utah men's lacrosse joined the ASUN Conference in July 2021.
• Big Ten: Five of the 14 full members sponsor men's lacrosse. A sixth team, Johns Hopkins, is a Division III member, but plays both men's and women's lacrosse in Division I and the Big Ten. Before a Division III rule change in early 2022, it was also one of five D-III schools specifically allowed by the NCAA to offer scholarships in its Division I sports. (Division III schools that play selected Division I sports are now allowed to offer scholarships in Division I sports.)
• Pac-12: See Big 12 above.

Wrestling:

• Big 12: Four of the 10 full members sponsor wrestling, as does future member Arizona State. As of the upcoming 2023–24 season, they are joined by nine single-sport associates—Air Force and Wyoming (both MW); California Baptist and Utah Valley (both in the Western Athletic Conference); Missouri (SEC); North Dakota State and South Dakota State (both in the Summit League); Northern Colorado (in the Big Sky Conference); and Northern Iowa (in the Missouri Valley Conference). Oklahoma's wrestling affiliation once it leaves for the SEC has yet to be determined.
• Pac-12: Three full members sponsor wrestling, two of which (Arizona State and Stanford) will leave in 2024. They are joined by single-sport members Cal Poly, CSU Bakersfield, and Little Rock. The two California single-sport members are otherwise members of the Big West Conference, while Little Rock is a full member of the Ohio Valley Conference.
• SEC: Missouri, the only SEC school to sponsor the sport, competed in the MAC through the 2020–21 season, after which it returned to its former full-time home of the Big 12 as a single-sport member.

Men's Volleyball: As of the next NCAA men's volleyball season in 2024 (2023–24 school year), 29 Division I members will sponsor varsity men's volleyball, with a large majority being mid-major programs. In fact, D-I men's volleyball schools are outnumbered by Division II schools; members of both divisions compete under identical scholarship limits for a single national championship. Before 2012, this championship was also open to Division III schools, but explosive growth in the sport at that level in the 21st century led to the creation of a separate D-III championship. The only D-I all-sports leagues to sponsor the sport are the mid-major Big West Conference and Northeast Conference. With that in mind, the five Power Five schools with men's volleyball programs are aligned as follows:

• Big Ten: Ohio State and Penn State both play in single-sport leagues, respectively in the Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association and Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association.
• Big 12: The only member that sponsors men's volleyball, BYU, competes in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF).
• Pac-12: All three members with men's volleyball programs—Stanford, UCLA, and USC—compete in the MPSF. Even with UCLA and USC leaving for the Big Ten in 2024, the latter conference will have only four men's volleyball schools, two short of the minimum needed for an automatic bid to the combined D-I/D-II championship (and for official Big Ten sponsorship), making it likely that both will remain in MPSF men's volleyball. The same holds true for Stanford, which will become the only ACC member with a varsity men's volleyball team.

Men's Water Polo: Only 25 Division I members sponsor varsity men's water polo. As with men's volleyball, a large majority of the D-I schools that sponsor the sport are mid-major programs. The NCAA conducts a single national championship open to all member schools, regardless of division.

• Pac-12: The only Power Five schools that sponsor the sport are the California members of the Pac-12—California, Stanford, UCLA, and USC. All compete in the MPSF, and will likely remain in that conference for men's water polo after their moves to the ACC (California, Stanford) and Big Ten (UCLA, USC).

Beach Volleyball: A women-only sport at the NCAA level, beach volleyball is sponsored by only one Power Five conference, the Pac-12. Nine of that conference's schools sponsor the sport (with the exceptions being Colorado, Oregon State, and Washington State). Other Power Five schools that sponsor the sport are aligned as follows:

• ACC: Florida State competes in the Coastal Collegiate Sports Association (CCSA), a league that only sponsors beach volleyball plus men's and women's swimming & diving. Both schools joining from the Pac-12 in 2024, California and Stanford, also sponsor the sport. This leaves the ACC one member short of being able to sponsor the sport.
• Big Ten: Nebraska competes as an independent. All four schools joining from the Pac-12 in 2024—Oregon, UCLA, USC, and Washington—sponsor the sport. However, this remains one short of the six sponsoring members required under Big Ten bylaws for official sport sponsorship.
• Big 12: TCU competes in Conference USA, and departing member Texas is an independent. Three of the four schools joining from the Pac-12 in 2024 sponsor the sport—Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah. Big 12 bylaws allow the conference to hold a championship event in any sport in which four members compete. Currently, the Big 12 sponsors a championship in women's equestrian, part of the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women program, with four participating schools. The conference has yet to announce whether it will add the sport.
• SEC: LSU and South Carolina compete in the CCSA, and future member Texas is independent. Mississippi State has been approved by the NCAA to compete, but has yet to do so.

Women's Field Hockey:

• Pac-12: The two Pac-12 members that sponsor field hockey, California and Stanford, play in the America East Conference. Both will join the field hockey-sponsoring ACC in 2024.

Women's Ice Hockey:

• ACC: Boston College plays alongside its men's team in Hockey East. Syracuse plays in College Hockey America (CHA), a league that sponsors only women's ice hockey. CHA will merge with the men's only Atlantic Hockey Association after the 2023–24 season; the branding of the merged entity has not yet been announced.
• Big Ten: Four Big Ten members sponsor women's ice hockey. Minnesota, Ohio State, and Wisconsin play in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (which became women-only in 2021 after most of its former men's members left to reestablish the Central Collegiate Hockey Association), while Penn State plays in CHA.

Women's Lacrosse:

• Big Ten: Six of the 14 full members sponsor women's lacrosse, as do future members Oregon and USC. Johns Hopkins, as noted previously, is a Division III school that plays lacrosse in Division I.
• Big 12: Cincinnati, the only current member that sponsors women's lacrosse, remained in its former full-time home of the American Athletic Conference as a single-sport member. Future Big 12 members Arizona State and Colorado also sponsor the sport.
• Pac-12: Six of the 12 full members sponsor women's lacrosse, all of which will leave for other conferences in 2024: Arizona State and Colorado for the Big 12; California and Stanford for the ACC; and Oregon and USC for the Big Ten. The Pac-12 added two women's lacrosse associates for the 2024 season: San Diego State, already a Pac-12 men's soccer member, and UC Davis.
• SEC: The only two members that sponsor women's lacrosse, Florida and Vanderbilt, compete in The American.

Women's Rowing:

• Big 12: Six of the 14 full members sponsor women's rowing. They are joined by Alabama and Tennessee, the only two SEC schools to sponsor the sport. These schools are listed in italics as part of the SEC.
• SEC: See Big 12 above. However, future SEC members Oklahoma and Texas both sponsor the sport. While the SEC has not announced any plans to launch a women's rowing league, SEC bylaws allow the conference to hold a championship event in any sport in which four members compete. Currently, the SEC sponsors a championship in women's equestrian, part of the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women program, with four participating schools.

Women's Water Polo: Only 33 Division I members sponsor varsity women's water polo. As with men's water polo, a large majority of the D-I schools that sponsor the sport are mid-major programs. The NCAA conducts a single national championship open to all member schools, regardless of division.

• Big Ten: The only two Big Ten schools that sponsor the sport, Indiana and Michigan, respectively compete in the MPSF and the varsity division of the Collegiate Water Polo Association.
• Pac-12: Five Pac-12 schools—the four California members, plus Arizona State—compete in the MPSF. All are likely to remain in MPSF women's water polo after joining their new primary conferences. Arizona State will be the only Big 12 member to sponsor the sport, and California and Stanford will be the only ACC members to do so. UCLA and USC will join Indiana and Michigan as Big Ten members that sponsor varsity women's water polo, but that conference will still be two short of the six sponsoring members required under conference bylaws for official sports sponsorship.

• College Football Association
• Superconference
• Mid-major