History of NFL Championships Throughout its history , the National Football League and other leagues have used several different formats to determine their league champion , including a period of interleague match - ups determining a true world champion . The NFL first determined champions through end - of - season standings , but switched to a playoff system in 1933 . The rival All - America Football Conference and American Football League , which have since merged with the NFL ( some AAFC teams in ) , but because of a problem with the NFL - AAFC merger , AAFC championships games and records do not count in NFL record books . The AFL begun play in 1960 and used a playoff system to determine its champions like the league it was rivaling at time of formation . From – prior to the AFL - NFL merger in 1970 , the NFL and the AFL agreed to hold an ultimate championship game , first called the AFL - NFL World Championship game and later renamed the Super Bowl after 1968 . The most important factor of the merger was that all ten AFL teams joined the NFL in and every AFL championship game and record count in NFL record books . Since the merger , the NFL has become the only major professional football league in the United States . The Super Bowl was originally a game between the AFL and the NFL but after the merger , the Super Bowl was retooled as the NFL ' s championship game . The old NFL Championship game became the NFC Championship Game , while the old AFL Championship became the AFC Championship Game . The NFL lists the old AFL / NFL championship games with " new " AFC / NFC championship games in its record books . In the NFL ' s " modern era " ( since the AFL - NFL merger in 1970 ) the Steelers have posted the best record in the league . The franchise have accumulated the most Super Bowl wins ( six ) since the modern game started in 1970 . It is second overall in playoff wins and tied with the Miami Dolphins for most regular - season wins . Since the merger , the team ' s playoff record is 33 – 19 ( . 635 ) , which is second best in terms of playoff winning percentage behind the Green Bay Packers ' playoff record of 28 – 16 ( . 636 ) , through 23 January 2011 . 1920 – 1932 : The early years . At its inception in , the NFL had no playoff system or championship game . The champion was the team with the best record during the season , determined by winning percentage , with ties omitted . This sometimes led to very odd results , as teams played anywhere from six to twenty league games in a season , and not all teams played the same number of games or against league talent . As a result , in the league ' s first six seasons , four league titles were disputed and had to be resolved by the league ' s executive committee . In 1920 , the Akron Pros went undefeated , but two teams that had won more games ( and who had both tied Akron ) , the Buffalo All - Americans and Decatur Staleys , petitioned the league for a share of the title ; both teams ' petitions were denied , and Akron was awarded the first ( and only ) Brunswick - Balke Collender Cup . The next was in the 1921 NFL season , between the same All - Americans and Staleys ( with the latter now being based in Chicago ) . Buffalo had insisted that the last matchup between the two was an exhibition match not to be counted toward the standings ; however , Chicago owner George Halas , as well as league management , insisted the game be counted in its standings ( the league , at the time , did not recognize exhibition matches ) . The result was that although the two teams were effectively tied in the standings , the disputed game , having been played later , was given more weight and thus ended up being considered a de facto championship game . ( Chicago also had one less tie game . ) A nearly identical situation recurred in 1924 , when Chicago tried the same tactic of a final game against the Cleveland Bulldogs , but the league ruled the opposite and declared the last game " post - season , " giving the Bulldogs their third consecutive league title . The fourth and final disputed title was the 1925 NFL Championship controversy between the Pottsville Maroons and the Chicago Cardinals . The Maroons had been controversially suspended by the league at the end of the 1925 NFL season for an unauthorized game against a non - NFL team , allowing the Cardinals to throw together two fairly easy matches ( one against a team consisting partly of high school players , also against league rules ) to pass Pottsville in the standings . The league awarded the Cardinals the title , one of only two in the team ' s history , in a decision that continues to be disputed to this day , with Cardinals owners opposing any change in the record and the two current Pennsylvania teams in favor . No action has been taken by the league itself to address the issue , although a self - made championship trophy from the Maroons sits in the Pro Football Hall of Fame . Ironically , it was Pottsville ' s win in this game against the Notre Dame All - Stars that gave professional football legitimacy over college football . Part of the controversy over these stems from the criteria the league used to determine its champion . The league used a variation of " win percentage " as its criterion , in which the number of wins is divided by the sum of wins and losses . Ties were treated as if the game had never been played . The league began considering ties in its standings in 1974 , counting them as half a win and half a loss ; this was not applied retroactively . Had it been , it would have changed several championships : the Buffalo All - Americans would have won a share of the 1920 title , and the Duluth Kelleys would have tied for first place in 1924 . Had win - loss differential , the standard used in baseball , been used , the 1924 title would have gone to yet another team : the Frankford Yellow Jackets , who were four games ahead of eventual champion Cleveland in the standings by that measure ; the Decatur Staleys would have similarly won the 1920 title by virtue of being one game ahead of Buffalo . In the season , the Chicago Bears and the Portsmouth Spartans tied with the best regular - season winning percentages ( although the Green Bay Packers had four more wins ) . To determine the champion , the league voted to hold the first official playoff game in Chicago at Wrigley Field . Because of severe winter conditions before the game , and fear of low turnout , the game was held indoors at Chicago Stadium which forced some temporary rule changes . The game was played on a modified 80 - yard dirt field , and Chicago won 9 – 0 , winning the league championship . A number of new rule changes were instituted , many inspired by the 1932 indoor championship game : the goal posts were moved forward to the goal line , every play started from between the hash marks , and forward passes could originate from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage ( instead of five yards behind ) . The playoff game proved so popular that the league reorganized into two divisions for the season , with the winners advancing to a scheduled championship game . 1933 – 1966 : The advent of the postseason . 1933 – 1966 : NFL Championship Game . Starting in , the NFL decided its champion through a single postseason playoff game , called the " NFL Championship Game " . During this period , the league divided its teams into two groups , through as " divisions " and from 1950 onward as " conferences " . The home team for the NFL Championship Game was determined by a yearly rotation between the conferences ( or divisions ) , not by regular - season records . If there was a tie for first place within the conference , an extra playoff game determined which team played in the NFL Championship Game . ( This occurred nine times in these 34 seasons : 1941 , 1943 , 1947 , 1950 ( both conferences ) , 1952 , 1957 , 1958 , and 1965 . ) This last occurred during the 1965 season , when the Green Bay Packers and Baltimore Colts tied for first place in the Western Conference at 10 – 3 – 1 . Green Bay had won both its games with Baltimore during the regular season , but because no tie - breaker system was in place , a conference playoff game was held on December 26 ( what was scheduled to be an off - week between the end of the regular schedule and the NFL Championship Game ) . The Cleveland Browns , the Eastern champion at 11 – 3 – 0 , did not play that week . The championship game was then held on its originally - scheduled date , January 2 , 1966 — the first time the NFL champion was crowned in January . Green Bay won both post - season games at home , beating the injury - riddled Colts ( with third - string QB Tom Matte ) in overtime by a controversial field goal , and taking the title 23 – 12 on a very muddy field ( in what turned out to be Jim Brown ' s final NFL game ) . For the 1960 through 1969 seasons , the NFL staged an additional postseason game called the " Playoff Bowl " ( aka the " Bert Bell Benefit Bowl " or the " Runner - up Bowl " ) . These games matched the second - place teams from the two conferences ; the CBS television network advertised them as " " playoff games for third place in the NFL . " " All ten of these consolation games were played in the Orange Bowl in Miami in January , the week " after " the NFL championship game . The NFL now classifies these contests as exhibition games and does not include the records , participants , or results in the official league playoff statistics . The Playoff Bowl was discontinued after the AFL - NFL merger ; the final edition was played in January 1970 . Starting with the 1934 game the winning team received the Ed Thorp Memorial Trophy . The trophy was named after Ed Thorp , a noted referee , rules expert , and sporting goods dealer . Thorp died in 1934 and a large , traveling trophy was made that year , passed along from champion to champion each season with each championship team ' s name inscribed on it . Teams would also receive a replica trophy . The trophy was last awarded to the Minnesota Vikings in 1969 . The actual trophy , however , is now missing . Late in the 1940 season , NFL President Carl Storck announced that sudden death periods would be authorized for any playoff game needed to decide either division title . It was emphasized that this did not apply to the final championship game , which would crown co - champions in the event of a tie . While a shared championship was deemed an acceptable solution , it must have become obvious that an elimination game leading to the championship must necessarily produce a winner . Commissioner Elmer Layden approved a similar arrangement for the 1941 season , with the same limitation . A coin toss would decide possession of the Ed Thorp trophy that accompanied the league title should the championship game result in a tie . Sudden death overtime was finally approved for the NFL championship game in 1946 and has remained in effect ever since . The first playoff game requiring overtime was the 1958 NFL Championship Game . The 1955 and 1960 NFL championship games were played on Monday afternoons , Christmas having fallen on a Sunday in those years . 1946 – 1949 : AAFC Championship Game . The All - America Football Conference was created in June 1944 to compete against the NFL . Even though the league outdrew the NFL in attendance , the continuing dominance of the Cleveland Browns led to the league ' s downfall . For its first three seasons , the league was divided into two divisions : Eastern and Western ( 1946 – 1948 ) . The league had no divisions in 1949 . The site of the championship game during the first three was determined just as it was in the NFL — a divisional rotation . In 1949 , the league held a four - team playoff , with home field based upon won - lost record . The Browns , led by Quarterback Otto Graham , won all four of the league championship games . A tiebreaker playoff game was played in 1948 to break a tie between the Baltimore Colts and Buffalo Bills ( AAFC ) for the Eastern Division championship . Semifinal playoff games were held in 1949 , setting up a championship final between the first - place Browns and the second - place San Francisco 49ers . In 1948 , the Browns became the first professional football team to complete an entire season undefeated and untied — 24 years before the 1972 Miami Dolphins of the NFL would accomplish the task , but this feat is not recognized by NFL record books . Unlike the AFL statistics which are treated as NFL statistics , records of the AAFC and its teams ( most of which folded ) are not recognized . However , individual AAFC player statistics are included in Pro Football Hall of Fame records , and the defunct conference is memorialized in the Hall . 1960 – 1966 : AFL Championship Game . With its creation in 1960 , the AFL determined its champion via a single playoff game between the winners of its two divisions , the Eastern and Western . The AFL Championship games featured classics such as the 1962 double - overtime championship game between the Dallas Texans and the defending champion Houston Oilers . At the time it was the longest professional football championship game ever played . Also in 1963 , an Eastern Division playoff was needed to determine the division winner between the Boston Patriots and Buffalo Bills . 1966 – 1969 : NFL vs . AFL — The beginning of the Super Bowl era . In 1966 , the success of the rival AFL , the spectre of the NFL ' s losing more stars to the AFL , and concern over a costly " bidding war " for players precipitated by the NFL ' s Giants ' signing of Pete Gogolak , who was under contract to the AFL ' s Buffalo Bills , led the two leagues to discuss a merger . Pivotal to this was approval by Congress of a law ( PL 89 - 800 ) that would waive jeopardy to anti - trust statutes for the merged leagues . The major point of the testimony given by the leagues to obtain the law was that if the merger were permitted , " Professional football operations will be preserved in the 23 cities and 25 stadiums where such operations are presently being conducted . " The merger was announced on June 8 , 1966 , and became fully effective in 1970 . After expanding to enfranchise the New Orleans Saints in , the NFL split its 16 teams into two conferences with two divisions each : the Capitol and Century Divisions in the Eastern Conference , and the Coastal and Central Divisions in the Western Conference . The playoff format was expanded from a single championship game to a four - team tournament , with the four divisional champions participating . The two division winners in each conference met in the " Conference Championships , " with the winners advancing to the NFL Championship Game . Again , the home team for each playoff game was determined by a yearly divisional or conference rotation . The AFL on the other hand , raised its total franchise number to nine in 1966 with the Miami Dolphins , joining the Eastern Division and a tenth team , the Cincinnati Bengals in 1968 . The league kept using the one - game - playoff format except when division tie - breakers were needed . With the addition of the Bengals to the Western Division in 1969 , the AFL adopted a four - team playoff to determine its champion . Following the NFL and AFL Championship Games for the through seasons , the NFL champion played the AFL champion in Super Bowl s I through IV , the only true inter - league championship games in the history of professional football . The first two of these games were known as the " AFL - NFL World Championship Game " , as the title " Super Bowl " was not chosen until 1968 . Thus the third AFL - NFL matchup was dubbed " Super Bowl III " and the first two matches were retronamed as Super Bowls I and II . The first two games were convincingly won by the NFL ' s Packers , the last two by the AFL ' s New York Jets and Kansas City Chiefs , leaving the leagues even at 2 - 2 in " World Championship " competition when they subsequently merged . All participants in those four AFL - NFL championship games were either AFL champions or NFL champions in the record books , no matter the outcome of the Super Bowl . Three of the four league champions who lost one of the first four Super Bowls would eventually win at least one . The exception is the Minnesota Vikings which went to three others and lost all of them . 1970 – present : The Super Bowl era . Post Merger . After the season and Super Bowl IV , the AFL and NFL fully merged and underwent a re - alignment for the season . Three of the pre - merger NFL teams were transferred to the AFC ( Browns , Colts , and Steelers ) to level the conferences ( AFC and NFC ) at 13 teams each ; each conference split into three divisions . Since there was now only one league , the Super Bowl became a league championship and the winner is the NFL champion . With only six division winners in the newly merged league , the NFL designed an eight - team playoff tournament , with four clubs from each conference qualifying . Along with the three division winners in each conference , two " wild card " teams ( one from each conference ) , the second - place finishers with the best records in each conference , were added to the tournament . The first round was named the " Divisional Playoffs , " the winners advancing to the " Conference Championships " ( AFC & NFC ) . Two weeks later , the AFC and NFC champions met in the Super Bowl , now the league ' s championship game . Thus , Super Bowl V in January 1971 was the first Super Bowl played for the NFL title . With the introduction of the wild card , a rule was instituted to prohibit two teams from the same division ( champion and wild card ) from meeting in the first - round ( Divisional Playoffs ) . This rule would remain in effect through the season . More significantly , the home teams in the playoffs were still decided by a yearly divisional rotation , not on regular - season records ( excluding the wild - card teams , who would always play on the road ) . This lack of " home - field advantage " was most evident in the 1972 playoffs , when the undefeated Miami Dolphins played the AFC Championship Game against the Pittsburgh Steelers , who had recorded three losses during the regular season , at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh . Beginning in , tie games were included in the computing of each team ' s winning percentage . Each tie was then counted as half of a win and half of a loss , rather than being omitted from the computation . In the past the NFL used to disregard any tie games played when they computed the standings , basing it on win / loss percentage with any ties thrown out and ignored . There were no overtime games played during the regular season . The institution of " home - field advantage " . In , the league modified its 1970 playoff format by instituting a seeding system . The surviving clubs with the higher seeds were made the home team s for each playoff round . The three division champions in each conference were seeded first through third based on their regular - season records , with the wild - card team in each conference as the fourth seed . Teams that earned the top seed became known as clinching " home - field advantage " throughout the playoffs , since they played all of their playoff games at their home stadium ( except for the Super Bowl , played at a neutral site ) . However , the league continued to prohibit meetings between teams from the same division in the Divisional Playoffs . Thus , there would be times when the pairing in that round would pit the first seed versus the third , and the second versus the fourth . This system is identical to that now in use by Major League Baseball . Further playoff expansion . The league expanded the playoffs to 10 teams in , adding a second wild - card team ( a fifth seed ) from each conference . The two wild - card teams from each conference ( the fourth and fifth seeds ) played each other in the first round , called the " Wild Card Playoffs . " The division winners ( the first three seeds ) would then receive a " bye " to automatically advance to the Divisional Playoffs , which became the second round of the playoffs . In the divisional round , much like the playoff format , teams from the same division were still prohibited from playing each other , regardless of seeding . Under the format , teams from the same division could meet only in the wild - card round or the conference championship . Thus , as before , a divisional champion could only play a divisional foe in the conference championship game . A players ' strike shortened the 1982 season to nine games . The league used a special 16 - team playoff tournament for that year . The top eight teams from each conference qualified ( ignoring the divisional races — there were no division standings , and in some cases 2 teams from the same division did not play each other at all that season ) . The playoffs reverted to the 1978 format in the following year . In , the NFL expanded the playoffs to twelve teams by adding a third wild - card team ( a sixth seed ) from each conference . The restrictions on intra - division playoff games during the Divisional Playoffs were removed . However , only the top two division winners in each conference ( the 1 and 2 seeds ) received byes and automatically advanced to the Divisional Playoffs as host teams . The 3 seed , the division winner with the worst regular season record in each conference , would then host the 6 seed in the Wild Card Playoffs . In , the NFL realigned into eight divisions , four per conference , to accommodate a 32nd team , the Houston Texans . The playoffs remained a 12 - team tournament , with four division winners ( the 1 , 2 , 3 , and 4 seeds ) and two wild card s ( the 5 and 6 seeds ) from each conference advancing to the playoffs . Again , only the top two division winners in each conference would automatically advance to the Divisional Playoffs , while everybody else had to play in the Wild Card round . Furthermore , the league still maintains the names " Wild Card Playoffs , " " Divisional Playoffs , " and " Conference Championships " for the first , second , and third rounds of the playoffs , respectively . A proposal to expand the playoffs to 14 teams by adding a third wild card team ( a seventh seed ) from each conference , and only giving the 1 seeds the bye in the first round , was tabled by the league owners in 2003 .