Seahawks to open Wednesday of Week 1 with Australia game Thursday
LOS ANGELES — The NFL introduced the Super Bowl LX champion Seattle Seahawks will open the season on the Wednesday of Week 1 as a substitute of internet hosting the standard Thursday evening opener.
The change is being made as a result of the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers will open their season in Melbourne, Australia in a game that will likely be broadcast on Thursday evening within the United States.
The Seahawks will play on NBC at 8:20 pm ET. The league has not introduced their Week 1 opponent.
The Rams and 49ers will play on Friday morning at 10:35 am native time in Australia, which is 8:35 pm ET. The league has not introduced a broadcast accomplice for the game.
The final time the NFL opened a season on a Wednesday evening was in 2012 when a game between the Super Bowl XLVI champion New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys was moved that day to keep away from battle with then-President Barack Obama’s speech on the Democratic National Convention on Thursday evening.
The previous two seasons, the NFL has performed a global game on the Friday after the season opener. In 2024, the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers performed in São Paulo, Brazil. In 2025, the Los Angeles Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs opened their season on Friday in São Paulo.
That isn’t an choice this 12 months as a result of of a provision within the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 that doesn’t permit broadcasts of skilled soccer video games on any Friday or Saturday from the second Friday in September by the second Saturday in December. The final two seasons, the day after the season opener fell on the primary Friday of September.
The game in Melbourne would be the first regular-season NFL game performed in Australia. The Rams have been introduced because the host group in February 2024, and the 49ers have been introduced as their opponent final month. The groups will play on the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).
The game is one of an NFL-record 9 worldwide video games scheduled for the 2026 season. The 49ers will even be the house group for a game on the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City this coming season.
