Cleveland Browns 2026 Strength of Schedule: Tied for 20th-Hardest in the NFL
The Cleveland Browns are tied for the 20th-hardest schedule in the NFL for 2026: their 17 opponents average 8.38 projected wins, and 5 of them are projected winning teams, 4 of those projected for 10 wins or more.
Cleveland Browns 2026 schedule
| Wk | Opponent | Opp Strength | Rest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jaguars | 7 | |
| 2 | Buccaneers | 7 | |
| 3 | Panthers | 7 | |
| 4 | Steelers | 4 | |
| 5 | Jets | 10 (+3) | |
| 6 | Ravens | 10+ win | 7 |
| 7 | Titans | 7 | |
| 8 | Steelers | 7 | |
| 9 | Saints | 7 | |
| 10 | Texans | Winning | 7 |
| 11 | Bye week | ||
| 12 | Raiders | 14 (+7) | |
| 13 | Bengals | 10+ win | 7 |
| 14 | Falcons | 7 | |
| 15 | Giants | 7 | |
| 16 | Ravens | 10+ win | 7 |
| 17 | Colts | 7 | |
| 18 | Bengals | 10+ win | 7 |
Toughest stretch
Weeks 16-18: at Ravens, Colts, at Bengals. two of the three are projected winning teams.
Softest stretch
Weeks 3-5: Panthers, Steelers, at Jets. None of the three is a projected winning team.
Rest: where the Browns sit
Across the 2026 season the Browns break exactly even on rest against their opponents. 2 games come at a rest deficit of three days or more, and 2 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.
How this is measured
Opponent strength here is the betting market's 2026 win total, not last season's record — a forward projection that already prices in the draft, free agency and coaching changes, and that carries none of the luck baked into a won-lost record.
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.
Browns schedule questions
Do the Browns have a hard schedule in 2026?
By market win totals, it is close to average. The Browns 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 5 of those opponents are projected winning teams.
When is the Browns bye week in 2026?
The Browns are on bye in week 11 of the 2026 regular season.
What is the toughest stretch of the Browns 2026 schedule?
Weeks 16 through 18, when the Browns play at Ravens, Colts, at Bengals — two of the three projected winning teams.
Where the Browns rank
Cleveland Browns 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.
The weekly insights email. One story a week about what actually happened in the NFL — every number verified.
Every Browns game, storied weekly.
The Muffed Browns Show — free, in your podcast app.
Ask this data a question
Every figure on this page comes out of Muffed's verified panel — and you can query the whole thing in plain English. No account, no key. Ask the data →
Use Muffed in your AI
Ask Claude or ChatGPT football questions and get these verified figures back, with sources. Add https://muffed.ai/api/mcp — free, no account, no API key.