College Football 2026 Opens August 29 in Dublin as North Carolina Meet TCU at Aviva Stadium
Week 0 puts six games on the board a week before the rest of the sport starts. North Carolina and No. 23 TCU kick off at noon ET at Aviva Stadium, and the first full Saturday follows on 5 September.
The 2026 college football season opens on 29 August with a six-game Week 0 slate, and the headline fixture is not in the United States. North Carolina meet No. 23 TCU at Aviva Stadium in Dublin at noon ET on ESPN, the latest instalment of a series that has become a fixture of the sport's opening weekend.
What Week 0 actually looks like
Six games are on the board. Alongside the Dublin game, NC State travel to Virginia at Scott Stadium for a 3:30 p.m. ET all-ACC opener on ESPN, and Memphis close the night at UNLV at 10 p.m. ET on FOX.
The rest of the slate is San Jose State at USC, Hawaii at Stanford and New Mexico State at Florida State. Hawaii's presence is the reason Week 0 exists at all: teams playing in or against the islands get an extra permitted game, and the exemption has quietly grown into a full opening weekend.
The calendar pushes everything back
Labor Day falls late in 2026, and the first full Saturday of the season is 5 September. That leaves a week where six teams have played and 130 have not, which matters more for markets than it does for the standings.
The Week 1 games that carry weight
Clemson at LSU on 5 September, 7:30 p.m. ET on ABC, is the pick of the openers. Boise State at Oregon on CBS in the afternoon window is the other ranked meeting.
Sunday adds two neutral-site games: Wisconsin against Notre Dame in Green Bay and Louisville against Ole Miss in Nashville, both at 7:30 p.m. ET. SMU at Florida State closes the weekend on Monday night.
Following it on Playdash
Playdash prices college football from Week 0 onward with point spreads, totals and moneylines on every FBS game, alongside first-half and quarter markets and player props on passing, rushing and receiving yards. Season-long outrights on the College Football Playoff, conference titles and regular-season win totals are open now.
Fixtures, kickoff times and networks as published on 20 August 2026; times and broadcast assignments are subject to change.