Television networks have long agreed that the Pittsburgh Steelers draw eyeballs. During a post-bye stretch this fall, the Steelers will have quite the audience week after week.

The Steelers will play five consecutive games in high-profile viewing windows, making for one of the most notable themes of their 2026 schedule announced Thursday evening. Beginning with an appearance on “Sunday Night Football” at the Cincinnati Bengals on Nov. 15, the Steelers from NFL Weeks 10-14 will play three times in primetime, once in the 4:25 p.m. Sunday time slot and also for the first time play on “Black Friday.”

Each game is against a team most expect to contend — at very least — for a playoff spot. A week after the Bengals game is a trip across the commonwealth to face the Philadelphia Eagles, followed by hosting the Denver Broncos the day after Thanksgiving, another “Sunday Night Football” showing nine days later at Acrisure Stadium against the Houston Texans and concluding with the Steelers’ lone “Monday Night Football” appearance of 2026 on Dec. 14 at the Jacksonville Jaguars.

The Nov. 27 game will be the first the Steelers play on a Friday in more than 80 years — Sept. 20, 1946, when they beat the Chicago Cardinals.

“There is an appetite for NFL games, it seems, at all times of day and on all days of the week, and this one will be a new experience for us,” Steelers president Art Rooney II told the team’s official website. “We’ve hosted some games on holidays, Thanksgiving and Christmas in particular, and it’s always gone pretty well. I actually think that the day after Thanksgiving will be pretty well received, and I expect we’ll have a great show.”

The Steelers’ first primetime game of the season is another Thursday night trip up the Turnpike to play the rival Cleveland Browns, set for Week 4 on Oct. 1. This marks the fourth Steelers game in Cleveland over the past eight years to be played on a Thursday night.

The Browns won each of the previous three (in 2019, 2022 and 2024).

A Steelers game in Paris, France, on Oct. 25 against the New Orleans Saints was previously announced. What’s surprising, however, is that the Steelers do not have an idle week after their trip abroad. They instead will host the Browns on Nov. 1 in what is a reversal of last season when the Steelers hosted Cleveland the week after the Browns returned from playing in Europe.

The Steelers’ 2026 bye follows the game against Cleveland and falls almost directly in the middle of the season: Week 9.

The Steelers twill open at home for only the second time over their past 12 seasons, this time kicking off with an interconference game against the Atlanta Falcons at 1 p.m. Sunday, Sept 13.

“If you have an opportunity to open at home, open the season at home, it’s better,” Rooney said. “So we always look forward to when we get that opportunity. It seems like we don’t have that opportunity that often, so we appreciate the opportunity of doing that and opening up at home.”

Three of the Steelers’ first five games will be at home — the Bengals come to Pittsburgh on Sept. 27 and the Colts on Oct. 11 — but Acrisure Stadium will host only one NFL game over a 46-day span from that meeting with Colts until the Black Friday game against Denver. That, however, kicks off a stretch of playing four out of five at home, including the first meeting with the rival Baltimore Ravens on Dec. 20.

The other game against Baltimore sits in a familiar setting: Week 18 at M&T Bank Stadium. It’s the fourth time over the past eight regular seasons the Steelers will finish in Baltimore. Counting last season, it’s the fifth such finale against the Ravens since 2019.

That game, along with a Week 16 home matchup with the Carolina Panthers, have no concrete date set. The NFL flexes some late-season games, particularly often to Saturday kickoffs.

Rooney said those Christmas weekend games are de facto “flex” games and that the team won’t know the day and time of the meeting with the Panthers “until probably sometime in December.”

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As has previously been the case across the league, the possibility of “flex” exists for “Sunday Night Football” from Week 5 on. “Flex” scheduling for Monday and Thursday night games don’t begin until after Thanksgiving.

The Steelers in Week 2 will serve as the opponent for the home opener for the reigning AFC champion New England Patriots. The Steelers’ first game of calendar year 2027 is Week 17 at the Tennessee Titans.

Unless the Titans make the playoffs and earn a home game, that is to be the final game played at Nissan Stadium in Nashville. The Titans plan to move into a new home venue for the 2027 season.

“Being on the road the last two weekends in a row is not ideal,” Rooney said, “but we can’t complain because we’ve got two home games before those two road games.”

Incidentally, the Steelers will play in the second game at the new Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park, N.Y. The Steelers finish their three-game preseason schedule there against the Buffalo Bills, who will open up their $2.2 billion home two weeks earlier with their preseason opener against the Carolina Panthers.

2026 Steelers schedule

(all days Sunday unless noted)

PRESEASON

Aug. 13 (Thur.) — Green Bay Packers, 7 p.m.

Aug. 21 (Fri.) — New York Jets, 7 p.m.

Aug. 27 (Thur.) — at Buffalo Bills, 7 p.m.

REGULAR SEASON

Sept. 13 — Atlanta Falcons, 1 p.m.

Sept. 20 — at New England Patriots, 1 p.m.

Sept. 27 — Cincinnati Bengals, 1 p.m.

Oct. 1 (Thur.) – at Cleveland Browns, 8:15 p.m.

Oct. 11 — Indianapolis Colts, 1 p.m.

Oct. 18 — at Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 1 p.m.

Oct. 25 — vs. New Orleans Saints (in Paris), 9:30 a.m.

Nov. 1 — Cleveland Browns, 1 p.m.

**Bye week, Week 9**

Nov. 15 — at Cincinnati Bengals, 8:20 p.m.

Nov. 22 — at Philadelphia Eagles, 4:25 p.m.

Nov. 27 (Fri.) — Denver Broncos, 3 p.m.

Dec. 6 — Houston Texans, 8:20 p.m.

Dec. 14 (Mon.) — at Jacksonville Jaguars, 8:15 p.m.

Dec. 20 — Baltimore Ravens, 1 p.m.

(TBD) — Carolina Panthers, TBA

Jan. 3 — at Tennessee Titans, 1 p.m.

TBD — at Baltimore Ravens, TBA