The Worst Teams in NFL History

The worst teams in NFL history are the 2008 Detroit Lions and the 2017 Cleveland Browns, the only two clubs ever to finish 0-16 in a full 16-game season. The Lions did it first, and the Browns matched their winless misery nine years later, setting a floor for futility that no team has since fallen below.

Bad seasons happen every year, but complete winless campaigns are extraordinarily rare, because even a poor NFL team usually stumbles into a win or two. Here is the full list of the worst teams in NFL history, the seasons behind them, and how the schedule change now redraws the bottom of the record book. All figures are as of the 2025 season.

The worst of the worst: two 0-16 teams

The 2008 Lions became the first team to lose all 16 games of a full season, a collapse so complete that it overshadowed everything else about the franchise that year. In 2017, the Browns joined them at 0-16 as part of a two-year stretch in which they went 1-31, arguably the worst 32-game run in league history.

Both teams turned a single winless season into a defining moment. The Lions’ 0-16 remains a benchmark for how far an NFL team can fall, and the Browns’ repeat performance proved it was not a one-off fluke.

The full list of the NFL’s worst teams

The table below ranks the worst single seasons in NFL history by record and winning percentage.

Rank	Team	Season	Record	Win %
1	Detroit Lions	2008	0-16	.000
1	Cleveland Browns	2017	0-16	.000
3	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	1976	0-14	.000
4	Detroit Lions	1942	0-11	.000
5	New Orleans Saints	1980	1-15	.063
5	Dallas Cowboys	1989	1-15	.063
5	New England Patriots	1990	1-15	.063
5	San Diego Chargers	2000	1-15	.063
5	Miami Dolphins	2007	1-15	.063
5	St. Louis Rams	2009	1-15	.063

The four winless teams sit at the very top, followed by a cluster of 1-15 seasons spread across four decades. The list runs from the 1942 Lions in the early days of the league to the modern winless clubs.

The winless clubs beyond 0-16

Below the two 0-16 teams, the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers stand out. As an expansion team, they went 0-14 in their first season and then lost their first 12 games of 1977, a 26-game losing streak that remains the worst start to a franchise’s existence. The 1942 Detroit Lions went 0-11 and were outscored so heavily that they rank among the most lopsided winless teams ever. These historic collapses feed directly into our leaderboard of the longest losing streak in the NFL and our look at the worst record in NFL history.

The 1-15 disasters

Just above the winless teams sits a long line of 1-15 seasons, each one a single lucky afternoon away from history. The 1980 New Orleans Saints were so bad their fans wore paper bags and dubbed them the “Aints,” while the 1989 Dallas Cowboys bottomed out in Jimmy Johnson’s first year before building a dynasty. The 1990 Patriots and 2000 Chargers round out a group that shows how quickly fortunes can turn, since several of these franchises later won championships. For the opposite extreme, see our list of every undefeated NFL team.

Why the record matters, and what comes next

A winless season is the rarest kind of failure in a league designed for parity, which is why the 2008 Lions and 2017 Browns are remembered as the worst of all time. The NFL’s move to a 17-game schedule in 2021 means the record low is now 0-17, a mark no team has reached, so the current 0-16 teams sit at the bottom for now. Whenever a team flirts with a winless year, these are the names it is measured against.

The short version: the worst teams in NFL history are the 2008 Lions and 2017 Browns, both 0-16, ahead of the 0-14 1976 Buccaneers and 0-11 1942 Lions. A group of 1-15 teams follows, and a future 0-17 season would set a new low. All figures are as of the 2025 season.