Super Bowl goes back to Bay Area; 49ers to host in 2026 at Levi's Stadium
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SANTA CLARA, Calif. (AP) — The Super Bowl will return to the Bay Area in 2026 at the home of the San Francisco 49ers, following a vote of approval by NFL owners on Monday at their spring meetings.
This will be the third time for the big game in the Bay Area. Levi's Stadium, which opened in Santa Clara in 2014, also hosted Super Bowl 50 when Denver beat Carolina. The 49ers won Super Bowl 19 at Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto when they beat Miami after the 1984 season. The 2026 game will be Super Bowl 60.
Niners team president Al Guido said he hopes the NFL's decision to return to the Bay Area 10 years after the Super Bowl was last here is a sign that the region will be part of the regular rotation along with other Western cities like Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
“We needed a facility that had the size and scale that this one had,” Guido said. “There’s been a lot of changes that have happened around the facility and in general around the Bay. I think hosting this now in a competitive process 10 years after we hosted the first one, when you have other major markets that will continue to host, both SoFi Stadium, Allegiant Stadium, a lot has changed since we hosted. I do believe that this puts us up for future Super Bowls. We have to pull this one off.”
Guido said there will be some changes from Super Bowl 50 with more of the events in San Francisco moving from downtown to the waterfront area closer to where the Golden State Warriors built their new arena near the San Francisco Giants' ballpark.
Both those facilities are likely to be used for events this time around with the opening night ceremony expected to be held at Chase Center.
The Super Bowl will be part of a big 2026 for the Bay Area and Levi's Stadium, which also will host games in the World Cup that summer.
“(It's) going to be an amazing year for our region,” Bay Area Host Committee President and CEO Zaileen Janmohamed said. “It’s the same year that San Francisco turns 250 years old and it’s also the year that we will host FIFA World Cup matches. So with the addition of hosting Super Bowl 60, we have this incredible opportunity that doesn’t really exist anywhere else to unite the entire region with sport across multiple sporting events. I’m ready and excited.”
The next Super Bowl is scheduled for Feb. 11, 2024, at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. Super Bowl 59 will be played at the Superdome in New Orleans in 2025.
The league also announced on Monday that the 2025 draft will be held in Green Bay. Detroit will host the 2024 edition, after it was held in Kansas City this year.
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AP Pro Football Writer Dave Campbell in Eagan, Minnesota, contributed to this report
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