The NHL salary cap rose only 11% over six years, from $79.5 million for the 2018-19 season to $88 million last season. The small uptick allowed most teams to spend up to the limit, but the slow growth days are over, with the cap set to jump 28% over the next three years to $113.5 million.
The increase has fueled concern that some small-market clubs will struggle to keep up player spending in a world where big-revenue teams drive the cap up and up—the salary floor also moves in conjunction and is $70.6 million for 2025-26 with a cap of $95.5 million.
The NHL wants to avoid creating a league of haves and have-nots, which plagues MLB, and the league was certainly aware of this issue as it negotiated its recent collective bargaining agreement that was ratified in July. The CBA increased the pool of money directed toward the league’s revenue-sharing system to support the bottom two-thirds of teams.
Starting with the 2026-27 season, the league raised the percentage of playoff ticket revenue it collects from teams from 35% for all four rounds to 50% in rounds two through four, and the first round still at 35%. The league doesn’t tax teams on the premium portion of the ticket, meaning in practice, it collected roughly 25% of gate receipts, and the new system will push that to 35% to 40%.
This additional league revenue will supplement the league’s existing revenue-sharing system that transfers 6.055% of hockey-related revenue from the top 10 teams—11 in the new CBA—to lower revenue teams.
The Stanley Cup playoffs grossed between $300 million and $400 million in ticket revenue before COVID-19, but the total was well above $500 million last year, even with all four of the U.S.-based Original Six teams missing the playoffs. The Edmonton Oilers grossed roughly $15 million per game during the Stanley Cup Final, marking the highest per-game ticket revenue in the history of the sport.
The NHL’s playoff move runs counter to the NBA, which traditionally kept 45% of home ticket revenue in the playoffs. In 2016, the league reduced its playoff cut to 25%, providing a significant boost in the opportunity for postseason profits. The NFL collects almost all ticket revenue from playoff games and simply provides a stipend for home and away teams that cover costs for travel and stadium operations.
Even without the NHL’s expanded playoff pool to goose revenue-sharing, low-revenue teams would see an increase in their check from the league. The NHL’s salary cap is determined by league revenue, and the CBA requires owners and players to evenly split HRR. But the revenue shortfall during the pandemic triggered a $1.5 billion player “debt.”
The debt was finally extinguished, but it had suppressed the cap and revenue-sharing pool. During the last couple of seasons, low-revenue teams received roughly 4% of HRR, versus 6.055%. The pool will return to 6.055% as the cap rises. The NHL’s 2024-25 HRR was $6.5 billion, a tick ahead of the $6.3 billion the prior season.
The average NHL team is worth $2.1 billion, per Sportico’s NHL valuations. That is up 17% versus last year, and 108% from 2022, marking the biggest gains of the five biggest North American men’s sports leagues.
