The preseason is over, and you may be wondering just how many players are on an NFL roster when the regular season begins.
Teams across the league are already dealing with cutdown day, working to put together the best roster they can in hopes of winning a Super Bowl trophy and not letting any good players leave the building.
All 32 NFL teams are allowed to have 90 players on their roster during this time, but with the Aug. 27 cutdown deadline right around the corner, teams are poised to make tough decisions that may leave fans wondering just how many players are on an NFL roster.
How Many Players Are on an NFL Roster?
NFL teams are allowed to have 53 players on their active roster throughout the season, and they can cut, trade, sign, and do whatever it takes to maintain a maximum of 53 players on their roster each week.
However, while teams are limited to 53 players on the active roster, that does not mean that those are the only players available throughout the year. Every team also has access to a practice squad.
What Is the Practice Squad?
Every team has a practice squad, a group of 17 players who are allowed to do what it sounds like — practice.
Every team has a roster of 53 players, but they are also allotted 17 slots for the practice squad. Included in that 17 is one spot for a player from an international pathway program.
Practice squad players are not technically on the roster and make significantly less on a week-to-week basis, but they are allowed to come up to the gameday roster when the team sees fit in the form of an elevation.
A player can only be elevated three times in one season. To play in a fourth game or more, they must be signed to the active roster; otherwise, they can’t play in any more games.
When combining the initial 53 men on gameday rosters and the 17 practice squad players they’re allotted, NFL rosters are essentially comprised of 70 different players at any one time.