How Does Fantasy Football Work? Leagues, Drafts and Scoring

Fantasy football works like this: you and a group of other managers each draft a team of real NFL players, and every week those players earn fantasy points from what they actually do on the field, such as yards, touchdowns and catches. In the most common format, your starting lineup's total is compared with one opponent's each week, and the higher score gets a win in your league standings.

Everything else, from waiver claims to trade deadlines, is a variation on that idea. Settings differ a lot from league to league, so the numbers below are common defaults, not universal rules. If you are still learning the sport itself, start with American football for beginners.

How a fantasy league is set up

A league is a group of managers, typically somewhere between 8 and 14, with 10 and 12 being common choices. One person, the commissioner, creates the league on a fantasy platform and controls its settings: roster size, scoring, schedule, trade rules and the playoff format.

Four choices shape a league before a season starts. The league type can be redraft (a fresh draft every year), keeper (each manager keeps a few players from last season) or dynasty (you keep your whole roster year to year). The scoring format can be standard, half-PPR or full PPR, where PPR means points per reception. Matchups can be head-to-head, with one opponent per week, or total points, where the highest season-long score wins. And the draft can be a snake or an auction.

Most season-long leagues among friends are free to play. Some leagues collect entry fees for prizes, and the rules on paid contests vary by state and country, so check what applies where you live.

The draft

The draft is where you build your team, and most leagues hold it in the weeks before the NFL season starts. Managers take turns choosing players until every roster is full. Once a player is drafted, no one else can have him unless a trade or a drop happens.

Snake draft

The most common format. The order reverses every round, so whoever picks last in round one picks first in round two. In a 12-team league, the manager in slot 12 gets picks 12 and 13 back to back, while the manager in slot 1 waits from pick 1 until picks 24 and 25.

The arithmetic for any slot: in a 12-team league, slot 3 picks 3rd overall, then 24 - 3 + 1 = 22nd in round two, then 24 + 3 = 27th in round three. Knowing your next pick number tells you how many players will be gone before you choose again.

Auction draft

Each manager gets the same budget of play money, often $200, and players are nominated one at a time and sold to the highest bidder. Anyone can get any player if they are willing to pay. The catch is that you have to fill your whole roster: with a $200 budget and 16 roster spots, spending $70 on one star leaves $130 for 15 players, and every spot costs at least $1.

Draft basics

Running backs and wide receivers fill the most starting spots, so they usually go early. Kickers and team defenses are hard to predict from week to week, which is why many managers take them in the last rounds. Check each player's bye week too, so you do not end up with several starters off in the same week.

Rosters and weekly lineups

A typical roster has about 15 or 16 players, split between starters and bench. A common starting lineup looks like this:

• 1 quarterback (QB)
• 2 running backs (RB)
• 2 wide receivers (WR)
• 1 tight end (TE)
• 1 flex, which can be an extra RB, WR or TE
• 1 kicker (K)
• 1 team defense and special teams (D/ST)

The rest sit on the bench, usually 6 or 7 spots, and many leagues add one or two injured reserve slots. Only your starters score points. Bench points do not count, however good they are.

You set your lineup each week, and each player typically locks when his NFL game kicks off, so a Thursday night player has to be decided before the rest of the week's games. Every NFL team has a bye week during the 17-game, 18-week regular season. A player on bye scores zero, so you need a backup ready. Some leagues add a superflex spot, which can be filled by a quarterback, making quarterbacks far more valuable.

How scoring works

Scoring settings vary, but many leagues start from defaults similar to these. Treat them as common defaults that your league may change.

• Passing: 1 point per 25 yards, 4 points per touchdown, minus 1 or minus 2 per interception
• Rushing and receiving: 1 point per 10 yards, 6 points per touchdown
• Receptions: 0 points (standard), 0.5 points (half-PPR) or 1 point (full PPR)
• Fumble lost: minus 2
• Two-point conversion: 2 points
• Kicker: often 3 points for a field goal under 40 yards, 4 for 40 to 49 yards, 5 for 50 or more, and 1 per extra point
• Team defense: points for sacks, interceptions, fumble recoveries, safeties and touchdowns, plus a sliding scale for points allowed, from a bonus for a shutout down to a penalty for allowing 35 or more

Worked example: standard vs PPR

Take a hypothetical wide receiver with 7 catches, 85 receiving yards and 1 touchdown. In standard scoring he earns 85 / 10 = 8.5 points for yards plus 6 for the touchdown, a total of 14.5. In half-PPR he adds 7 x 0.5 = 3.5 for his catches, for 18.0. In full PPR he adds 7, for 21.5.

Now a hypothetical quarterback with 280 passing yards, 2 touchdown passes, 1 interception and 20 rushing yards: 280 / 25 = 11.2, plus 2 x 4 = 8, plus 20 / 10 = 2, minus 2 for the interception = 19.2 points. In a league that takes only 1 point off for an interception, the same game is worth 20.2.

The format changes player values. PPR rewards players who catch a lot of short passes, such as slot receivers and pass-catching running backs, while standard scoring leans harder on yards and touchdowns. Some leagues award fractional points for every yard, others round down, so check your settings.

Waivers, free agents and trades

Players who are not on any roster can be picked up during the season. How that works depends on the league:

• Waivers: a newly dropped player, and in many leagues every unrostered player once games start, goes on waivers for a set period, often a day or two. Managers put in claims, and the league awards each player by priority.
• Waiver order: either a rolling list, where a successful claim sends you to the back of the line, or reverse standings, where the worst team gets first choice.
• FAAB (free agent acquisition budget): each manager gets a season budget, often $100, and makes blind bids. If you bid $18 and a rival bids $15, you get the player and have $82 left for the season.
• Free agency: once waivers clear, remaining players can be added instantly, first come, first served.

Trades let managers swap players. Most leagues have a review period during which the commissioner or the other managers can object, and a trade deadline a few weeks before the fantasy playoffs. Collusion, meaning a trade designed to help one team unfairly, is against the rules in almost every league.

Matchups, standings and playoffs

In a head-to-head league, each week you face one opponent. If your starters score 112.4 and your opponent's score 108.9, you win that week, and your record moves to the next win. Results are often not settled until the Monday night game ends, which is why that game matters so much to fantasy managers.

Standings are usually ranked by win-loss record, with total points scored as a common tiebreaker. The top teams, often four or six, make the fantasy playoffs, which commonly run over the final weeks before the NFL regular season ends. Many leagues finish before Week 18, the last week of the NFL regular season, because some teams that have already clinched rest their starters. The NFL's own postseason, explained in our guide to how many teams make the NFL playoffs, is usually not part of season-long fantasy at all.

Other ways to play

Season-long redraft leagues are the classic format, but there are plenty of variations. In best ball you draft a roster and never set a lineup; each week your highest-scoring players are counted automatically. Keeper and dynasty leagues carry some or all of your players into next season, which brings rookies and long-term planning into the picture. Superflex and two-quarterback leagues add a second quarterback slot that changes the whole draft.

IDP leagues, short for individual defensive players, have you start real defenders such as linebackers and safeties instead of a team defense. Daily fantasy is a different product altogether: one-day or one-week contests where you pick a new lineup under a salary cap. These are usually paid contests, and their legal status varies by state.

First-season checklist

• Read your league's scoring and roster settings before the draft.
• Know your draft slot and, in a snake draft, your next few pick numbers.
• Spread out bye weeks among your starters.
• Set your lineup before the first game of each week, and check again before Sunday's early games.
• Check injury reports and move injured players to the bench or injured reserve.
• Use waivers every week; injuries and new starters create opportunities.
• Note the trade deadline and the weeks your fantasy playoffs run.
• Keep it fun. Most leagues are about the group, not the prize.