Worst Record in NBA History

The worst winning percentage in NBA history belongs to the 2011-12 Charlotte Bobcats, who went 7-59 for a .106 mark. By total losses over a full season, the record is the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers’ 9-73, a line that stood as the definition of a bad basketball team for decades.

“Worst record” in the NBA depends on which lens you use, because one famously terrible season was shortened by a lockout. Winning percentage rewards the lowest ratio of wins to games; total losses reward the fullest collapse over 82 games. Here is how the league’s worst seasons rank, and why these teams sit at the bottom. All figures are through the 2025 season.

The record holder by percentage: the 2011-12 Bobcats

The 2011-12 Charlotte Bobcats won just 7 of 66 games, a .106 winning percentage that is the lowest in NBA history. The season was compressed by a lockout that cut the schedule from 82 games to 66, and Charlotte finished it on a 23-game losing streak that ran into the offseason. Michael Jordan owned the franchise, which made the historic ineptitude all the more glaring.

Because the Bobcats never had a chance to accumulate more wins over a full schedule, their record is best understood as a rate: they lost nearly nine of every ten games they played.

The full leaderboard of NBA futility

The table below ranks the worst NBA seasons, balancing winning percentage against total losses.

Team	Season	Record	Win%	Note
Charlotte Bobcats	2011-12	7-59	.106	Worst win% (66-game season)
Philadelphia 76ers	1972-73	9-73	.110	Most losses, full season
Philadelphia 76ers	2015-16	10-72	.122	Low point of “The Process”
Dallas Mavericks	1992-93	11-71	.134	Early-’90s collapse
Denver Nuggets	1997-98	11-71	.134	Lost 23 straight

The Bobcats lead on percentage; the 1972-73 76ers lead on losses. Below them sit the 2015-16 76ers and a pair of 11-71 teams from the 1990s that just missed the very bottom.

The 1972-73 76ers: the full-season standard

Over a full 82-game schedule, no team has been worse than the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers, who finished 9-73. That is the most losses in a single NBA season, and for a long time it was the number every struggling team was measured against. The Sixers lost 20 in a row at one point and were outclassed almost nightly, a total-roster failure rather than a lockout-shortened fluke.

Their 9-73 mark endures because it required a full season of losing to reach 73 defeats. A team can post a worse percentage in a short year, but piling up 73 losses over 82 games is its own kind of record.

The 2015-16 76ers and “The Process”

The most modern entry on the list is the 2015-16 Philadelphia 76ers, who went 10-72 at the low point of a deliberate rebuild known as “The Process.” Under a strategy of trading present wins for future draft capital, Philadelphia tanked for several seasons, and 2015-16 was the bottom. It was intentional futility, which sets it apart from the accidental collapses elsewhere on the list.

The Process eventually produced All-Stars and playoff teams, so unlike the other clubs here, the 76ers’ worst season was a means to an end. It is a reminder that a terrible record can be a strategy as much as a failure.

Where these records fit

Baseball’s worst seasons are measured in triple-digit losses, and the NFL’s in winless years, but the NBA’s floor is defined by these percentage and loss extremes. They are the opposite pole from the league’s greatest seasons, such as the best regular-season record in NBA history and the record-setting 2015-16 Warriors’ 73-9 season, which sat at the very top the same year the record book’s bottom was being rewritten elsewhere.

Why the worst records matter

An NBA season this bad usually signals something structural: a lockout, a rebuild, or a roster in transition. The Bobcats were caught in a compressed schedule with a thin roster; the 2015-16 76ers were tanking on purpose; the 1972-73 Sixers were simply overmatched. Each record captures a different route to the bottom.

That variety is why the marks have held. It takes an unusual combination of circumstances to lose at a .106 clip or drop 73 games, and those circumstances rarely repeat.

The short version: the 2011-12 Charlotte Bobcats own the worst winning percentage in NBA history at .106 (7-59), the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers hold the full-season loss record at 9-73, and the 2015-16 76ers’ 10-72 is the modern low point. Through the 2025 season, those seasons define the league’s floor.