NBA broadcast shakeup

The National Basketball Association’s playoff map changed this spring: first-round and second-round games now bounce among ABC and ESPN, NBC and Peacock, and Prime Video. (sportingnews.com) The shift started with the league’s new 11-year media deals, which took effect in the 2025-26 season and run through 2035-36. The NBA said in July 2024 that Disney, NBCUniversal, and Amazon would split national game packages across broadcast, cable, and streaming. (nba.com) Under that setup, Amazon’s Prime Video got the entire SoFi NBA Play-In Tournament, while ABC remains the exclusive home of the NBA Finals. Sporting News’ 2026 playoff listings show the early postseason spread across four outlets before the championship round returns to one network. (aboutamazon.com) (sportingnews.com) NBCUniversal re-entered the NBA after losing the league in 2002, and its new agreement includes playoff games on NBC and Peacock plus six conference finals over 11 years. Disney kept the Finals, Christmas Day, and its regular ABC and ESPN packages under its renewal. (nbcuniversal.com) (thewaltdisneycompany.com) For viewers, the biggest practical change is that one postseason subscription or one channel lineup no longer covers most of April and May. Sporting News’ daily and series schedules list games on Peacock and Prime Video alongside traditional ABC, ESPN, and NBC windows. (sportingnews.com 1) (sportingnews.com 2) The league pitched that mix as broader distribution, saying all national games would be available on widely distributed streaming services and that the new contracts would put more national games on broadcast television. That promise now sits next to a postseason schedule that asks fans to track three media companies at once. (nba.com) Amazon’s package also reaches beyond the Play-In. The company said its 11-year deal includes 66 regular-season games each year, a Black Friday game, and the knockout rounds of the Emirates NBA Cup. (aboutamazon.com) NBCUniversal’s package includes about 100 national regular-season games each season, Monday games on Peacock, Sunday night games, opening night, and the All-Star Game. NBC has already used the return to revive its “NBA on NBC” branding for the 2025-26 season. (nbcuniversal.com 1) (nbcuniversal.com 2) The Finals did not move, but almost everything before them did. For anyone planning the rest of the postseason in 2026, the bracket is only half the schedule; the other half is finding which app or channel has the game that night. (sportingnews.com)