How Do the NBA Playoffs Work? Format Explained

Sixteen teams make the playoffs — eight from the Eastern Conference and eight from the Western Conference. Seeds 1 through 6 in each conference qualify automatically based on regular-season record, while seeds 7 and 8 are decided by a play-in tournament involving the teams that finished 7th through 10th. The two conference brackets stay separate until the NBA Finals.

Four rounds, all best-of-seven: the first round, the conference semifinals, the conference finals, and the NBA Finals. Each conference plays its own bracket down to a single champion, and those two conference champions meet in the Finals. A team must win four series — 16 games total — to win the title.

The higher-seeded team hosts more games in a series, following a 2-2-1-1-1 pattern: games 1, 2, 5 and 7 at home, games 3, 4 and 6 on the road. Seeding is based on regular-season record, so the better regular season earns the extra home games. In the Finals, home court goes to whichever finalist had the better overall record, regardless of conference.

Every playoff series is best-of-seven, meaning the first team to win four games advances and the series can last anywhere from four to seven games. A 4-0 result is a sweep. Because each round is a full seven-game series rather than a single game, upsets are harder than in a one-and-done bracket, and the better team usually prevails over the long series.

The [play-in tournament](/nba-play-in-tournament-explained/) determines the 7 and 8 seeds in each conference before the main bracket starts. The teams that finished 7th through 10th compete in a few games, with the winners claiming the last two playoff spots. Once those seeds are set, the standard 16-team, best-of-seven bracket begins as normal.

Yes. The Eastern and Western Conference brackets are played entirely separately through the first three rounds, producing one champion from each conference. Only in the NBA Finals do the two sides meet, when the Eastern Conference champion faces the Western Conference champion for the title. This is why a team only plays opponents from its own conference until the Finals.

Sixteen. With four best-of-seven rounds, a champion must win four games in each round — 4 times 4 equals 16 wins. Losing four games in any single series ends a team's run. That long road is why NBA champions are considered thoroughly tested, having survived up to 28 possible playoff games against the best teams in their conference and then the other.