A New Calendar for a New Era
Major League Soccer’s developmental arm, MLS NEXT Pro, is set to rewrite its competitive rhythm beginning in 2027, unveiling a Sprint Season that kicks off in February and a Summer‑to‑Spring format that will stretch into the following year.
The inaugural Sprint Season will feature fourteen regular‑time matches per club, running from mid‑February through late April, after which the league’s playoffs will culminate in the MLS NEXT Pro Cup in late May.
Starting in July 2027, clubs will enter a Summer‑to‑Spring schedule that splits twenty‑eight matches into two distinct windows — mid‑July to mid‑December and early February to early May — with the competition wrapping up with the Cup in June 2028.
This realignment is not merely a calendar tweak; it is a strategic move to synchronize the league’s timeline with Major League Soccer and the broader MLS NEXT pathway, creating a seamless pipeline for talent and ensuring that player development keeps pace with the sport’s global cadence.
The shift builds on a foundation laid since the league’s inception in March 2022, a period during which more than one thousand players have been loaned to MLS NEXT Pro and 270 have earned contracts with MLS first teams, while over thirteen hundred Academy prospects have tested themselves in the league.
Currently, thirty teams compete in MLS NEXT Pro — twenty‑seven tied to MLS clubs and three operating independently — and the league has signaled its intent to welcome additional clubs in the years ahead, promising continued growth and innovation.