2026 season

Buffalo Bills 2026 Strength of Schedule: Tied for 20th-Hardest in the NFL

The Buffalo Bills are tied for the 20th-hardest schedule in the NFL for 2026: their 17 opponents average 8.38 projected wins, and 11 of them are projected winning teams, 4 of those projected for 10 wins or more.

The latest Bills episode

Bills 26, Patriots 29 — Week 4: First Loss on the Last Throw

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What is left, through Week 5

The opponents the Bills have left rate plus 0.008 net expected points added per play between them — offence minus what their defences allow — which is 14th hardest of the 32 schedules that can be rated so far.

Through Week 5 · Data via nflverse · 12 of 12 remaining opponents rated

Buffalo Bills 2026 schedule

Buffalo Bills 2026 regular-season schedule with each opponent's projected strength and the rest days going into the game
Wk	Opponent	Opp Strength (Aug)	Kickoff ET	Rest
1	at Texans	Winning	Sun 1:00p	7
2	vs Lions	10+ win	Thu 8:15p	4
3	vs Chargers	Winning	Sun 1:00p	10 (+3)
4	vs Patriots	Winning	Sun 1:00p	7
5	at Rams	10+ win	Mon 8:15p	8
6	at Raiders	—	Sun 4:25p	6 (-1)
7	Bye week
8	vs Ravens	10+ win	Sun 1:00p	14 (+7)
9	at Vikings	—	Mon 8:15p	8
10	at Jets	—	Sun 1:00p	6 (-1)
11	vs Dolphins	—	Sun 1:00p	7
12	vs Chiefs	10+ win	Thu 8:20p	4
13	at Patriots	Winning	Sun 4:25p	10 (+3)
14	at Packers	Winning	Sun 8:20p	7
15	vs Bears	Winning	Sat 8:20p	6
16	at Broncos	Winning	Fri 4:30p	6 (+1)
17	at Dolphins	—	Sun 1:00p	9 (+2)
18	vs Jets	—	Sun 1:00p	7

Opponent strength is the opponent's 2026 market win total, bucketed: “10+ win” is a win total of 10.5 or better, “Winning” is 9.5 or better. Rest is days since that team last played, with the edge over the opponent in brackets. Kickoff times are Eastern and highlighted when the game starts at or after 8:00pm — the Bills have 6 primetime games, 3 of them on the road. The Bills are on bye in week 7.

Toughest stretch

Weeks 3-5: Chargers, Patriots, at Rams. Three straight projected winning teams, one of them projected for 10 wins or more.

Softest stretch

Weeks 9-11: at Vikings, at Jets, Dolphins. None of the three is a projected winning team.

Primetime: 2026 night games

The Bills play 6 games at or after 8:00pm Eastern, 3 at home and 3 on the road — weeks 2, 5, 9, 12, 14, 15. That is against a league average of 3.4, across 55 night games on the 2026 calendar.

Counts are AS SCHEDULED. Flex scheduling moves games into and out of the evening windows during the season, so an in-season count is only current as of the last time this artifact was regenerated.

Rest: where the Bills sit

Across the 2026 season the Bills are up 14 days of rest on their opponents across the seventeen games. 0 games come at a rest deficit of three days or more, and 3 come with a three-day edge the other way. Rest is zero-sum across the league — every day one team is rested is a day its opponent was not — so these net out to nothing across all 32 teams.

A rest gap only turns up in the record when it is bye-sized. Across regular-season games since 1999, a team coming off at least seven more days of rest than its opponent has won 53.6 percent (645 games); at a three-to-six day edge the rested team has won 49.6 percent, which is no edge at all. Rest is a margin, not a mover.

How this is measured

Opponent strength here is this season's net expected points added per play — a team's offence minus what its defence allows, through Week 5. The betting market stops quoting win totals once games are played, so the August line below is kept as a labelled prior rather than used as the ranking.

Read the spread before the rank. Across the whole league, hardest schedule to easiest covers about 1.5 win-total points spread over seventeen games — real, but small. Every win total in the market ends in a half-win and every schedule is seventeen games, so two schedules one place apart in the table differ by about 0.06 of a projected win, which is why 24 of the 32 teams share a rank with somebody else. Strength of schedule is a tiebreaker between two teams you already rate evenly. It is not a reason to move one of them.

Bills schedule questions

Do the Bills have a hard schedule in 2026?

By market win totals, it is close to average. The Bills are tied for the 20th-hardest schedule in the league — their 17 opponents average 8.38 projected wins, against a league average of 8.50 — and 11 of those opponents are projected winning teams.

When is the Bills bye week in 2026?

The Bills are on bye in week 7 of the 2026 regular season.

What is the toughest stretch of the Bills 2026 schedule?

Weeks 3 through 5, when the Bills play Chargers, Patriots, at Rams — all three projected winning teams.

How many primetime games do the Bills have in 2026?

Six as scheduled — three at home and three on the road — counting every kickoff at or after 8:00pm Eastern. Flex scheduling can move games into and out of the evening windows.

Where the Bills rank

Buffalo Bills are tied for the 20th-hardest schedule of the 32. The Cardinals have the hardest at 9.32, the Lions the easiest at 7.79. All 32 schedules ranked.

Buffalo Bills podcast and season preview · Bills running back depth chart · All 2026 bye weeks

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