MLS will hold its season from July to May starting in 2027

The way Major League Soccer figures it, the league schedule already starts in February and ends in December.

Why not flip things around and hold the playoffs in the balmy light of May rather than the frigid dark of winter?

The MLS Board of Governors voted Thursday to reverse the league calendar starting in the summer of 2027. After a shortened transitional season in the spring of 2027, the 2027-28 season will begin in July and run through the following May.

“The calendar shift is one of the most important decisions in our history,” MLS Commissioner Don Garber said in a league statement. “Aligning our schedule with the world’s top leagues will strengthen our clubs’ global competitiveness, create better opportunities in the transfer market, and ensure our Audi MLS Cup Playoffs take center stage without interruption. It marks the start of a new era for our league and for soccer in North America.”

The league will also take a winter break between mid-December and mid-February, with specific dates yet to be decided. And while MLS hasn’t made any blanket statements — pun intended — about Allianz Field’s unavailability for home games in December and February, the league is quite aware of Minnesota’s lack of comfortable winter soccer weather.

MNUFC chief executive Shari Ballard sought to assuage the concerns of fans in an email to ticket holders. “For cold-weather markets like ours, the league has taken a thoughtful approach to scheduling,” she wrote. “Between a league-wide winter break in mid-December to early February and strategic schedule modeling, our total number of home games during the coldest months of November through February should be very similar to the current schedule, and those home games will be played at Allianz Field.”

The Loons have never played a home game before March 1 and have played only one home game after Nov. 8. That was during the 2020 playoffs, so no home fans were affected because of COVID restrictions. The most famous February game in St. Paul was the U.S. men’s national team’s World Cup qualifier against Honduras in early February 2022, when temperatures dropped below zero and players were reportedly treated for hypothermia and frostbite after the game.

“Our Northern teams will be impacted far more than, certainly, our Southern teams,” Garber said. “But our Southern teams were very impacted by playing games in Texas and in Florida, parts of the United States that were super-hot during the summer window.”

As for the rest of the reasons for the change, the Loons could serve as a test case for the rest of the league.

Changing the schedule would allow for the league to break during June and early July, when many players are playing in international tournaments. That would avoid a year like Minnesota’s 2024, when its season was nearly derailed in June by international absences.

It would also align the league’s transfer windows with Europe, helping to avoid a repeat of the Loons’ 2025, when they lost star striker Tani Oluwaseyi to La Liga in Spain with six games to go in the regular season.

Starting in 2026, FIFA is set to move its fall international breaks to a three-week window in late September and early October and a two-week break in November. The schedule change would mean the playoffs are no longer interrupted by international play — as is happening right now to the Loons, who have six first-team players away from the club as it prepares for a conference semifinal matchup with San Diego.

The league is also reportedly considering a shift to a new schedule format in 2027-28, one that would see a move away from conferences to one set of standings. Under the new format, teams would be separated into six-team divisions and would play their division rivals home and away, plus a single game against the remaining 24 teams in the league. But the new format — and the new playoff setup that would come with it — isn’t finalized, and Garber said the league was “not yet ready to talk about that.”

MLS will also change how its TV package works, which could make games easier for fans to access in the future.

Instead of being a standalone League Pass offered by Apple, costing $100 per year or $15 a month, MLS games next season will be part of the Apple TV streaming service. The plan matches what other streaming providers have done with their sports rights and comes as Apple TV is also taking over the American TV rights for Formula 1 racing in 2026.

The Apple TV streaming service costs $12.99 per month.

The move should result in a wider potential audience for MLS games, rather than restricting viewing to only to those willing to subscribe to the leaguewide package. Upcoming MLS playoff games will be available on Apple TV without a League Pass subscription.