NFL Top 100 Players 2026: The Top 10 List So Far

How the NFL Top 100 Players 2026 vote works

The 2026 edition marks the 16th consecutive year that current NFL players have voted to determine the league's top 100, and the finish is deliberately slow. From June 22 through Aug. 21, NFL.com unveiled two names every weekday. The top 10 gets one player per weekday at 10 a.m. ET, running from Monday, Aug. 24 through Friday, Sept. 4.

That structure is why the NFL Top 100 players 2026 list behaves differently from an awards ballot. NFL.com describes it as voted on by the players themselves, a different input from a press-box ballot. It also means the list looks backward: the reveal began in June, so it prices last season.

The top 10 so far: Nos. 10, 9 and 8

Through the Aug. 26 reveal, three names in the NFL Top 100 players 2026 top ten are public on the official NFL.com countdown. One more drops every weekday at 10 a.m. ET after that, so check the countdown page for anything unveiled since:

No. 10: Patrick Surtain II, CB, Broncos (no change from 2025)

No. 9: Jahmyr Gibbs, RB, Lions (up 18 spots from No. 27)

No. 8: Micah Parsons, LB, Packers (up 28 spots)

Surtain holds his exact 2025 slot. He played 14 games with 47 tackles, 12 passes defensed and one interception, and per Next Gen Stats he allowed just one touchdown on 63 targets across 572 coverage snaps. Pass catchers averaged 2.1 yards of separation against him, second-lowest in the league at a 50-target minimum, behind only Quinyon Mitchell's 1.8.

Gibbs put up 1,223 rushing yards on 5.0 per carry with 13 rushing scores, plus 77 catches for 616 yards and five more touchdowns, finishing near 2,000 scrimmage yards on a 9-8 Lions team that missed the playoffs. Through three seasons he has 3,580 rushing yards, 1,449 receiving yards and 49 total touchdowns. Detroit traded David Montgomery to Houston and, per NFL.com, is pivoting to make Gibbs its bell cow for 2026.

Parsons is the volatility play. Green Bay traded for him, he sacked the quarterback in his Packers debut, and through Week 15 he ranked tied for third in sacks (12.5) and first in QB pressures (83) before a knee injury ended his season. He has posted at least 12 sacks in each of his five seasons, and he is not expected back until mid-October after a meniscus procedure.

Who is still live for Nos. 7 through 1

NFL.com named 12 contenders for the No. 1 spot. Four of those have already been slotted: Will Anderson Jr. at 12, Drake Maye at 11, Surtain at 10 and Gibbs at 9. The eight still unplaced after the Aug. 26 reveal are Josh Allen, Saquon Barkley, Myles Garrett, Christian McCaffrey, Puka Nacua, Bijan Robinson, Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Matthew Stafford. Seven slots remain above Parsons. That list was a No. 1 shortlist rather than a top-10 projection: Parsons was never on it and still landed at No. 8, so it is not a complete map of what is left.

The award hardware is stacked in that group. Stafford won AP MVP after leading the league with 4,707 passing yards and 46 passing touchdowns. Smith-Njigba won Offensive Player of the Year with a league-best 1,793 receiving yards and helped Seattle win Super Bowl LX. Garrett won Defensive Player of the Year and set the single-season sack record with 23. McCaffrey was Comeback Player of the Year and led the league with 413 touches.

History narrows it further. Since 2011 a quarterback has been voted No. 1 in 10 of 15 years. Only two defenders have ever taken the top spot, J.J. Watt in 2015 and Aaron Donald in 2019. Only Tom Brady (four times) and Patrick Mahomes (twice) have repeated at No. 1.

Biggest movers and the loudest snubs

The steepest climb among the top 20 names revealed so far belongs to James Cook, up 69 spots to No. 20 after winning the rushing title with 1,621 yards. Trey McBride rose 42 to No. 13 on a single-season tight end receptions record. Will Anderson Jr. climbed 34 to No. 12.

The falls are just as instructive. Mahomes dropped 13 spots to No. 18 after a torn ACL limited him to 14 games. Ja'Marr Chase fell 12 to No. 16 despite leading the AFC in catches and yards. Justin Jefferson slid 10 to No. 19 in a year he passed Randy Moss for the most receiving yards in NFL history through six seasons.

The genuine outlier is Lamar Jackson at No. 69, a slotting NFL.com itself flagged as controversial.

What the list actually tells you about futures

Treat this as a sentiment gauge, not a projection. The reveal began June 22, months before Week 1, and it prices last season rather than this one. That gap is the useful part.

Gibbs and Cook are the cases to watch in the MVP and Offensive Player of the Year conversation. Note what the actual hardware did last season: AP MVP went to Stafford, a quarterback, and Offensive Player of the Year went to Smith-Njigba, a receiver. A player vote is not an award vote. On defense, a top-10 finish for a healthy edge rusher keeps a player in the Defensive Player of the Year conversation, which is why the Parsons injury timeline matters more than his ranking does.

The list is backward-looking, so treat it as reputation data rather than a forecast. Pair it with the StatSniper breakdown of NFL win totals for 2026 and the NFL roster cuts tracker, then check the model side on the AI-powered NFL picks hub. If you want the reasoning rather than the number, Chad AI inside the StatSniper app will walk through why a player-vote spike is or is not tradeable.

What to watch next

Three things. The remaining reveals land one per weekday until No. 1 on Sept. 4. Week 1 will immediately stress-test the vote, particularly for Parsons, who will not be on the field. And the vote that shapes the 2027 edition of the NFL Top 100 is being earned in September, not December.

FAQ

Who is No. 1 on the NFL Top 100 of 2026? Not yet announced. NFL.com reveals one top-10 player per weekday and No. 1 arrives Friday, Sept. 4. Saquon Barkley was voted No. 1 for 2025, and NFL.com lists him again among 12 contenders after a 1,140-yard rushing, 1,413-scrimmage-yard season.

Who votes on the NFL Top 100? Current NFL players. NFL.com describes it as voted on by the players themselves, and it has run that way for 16 straight years. That is why it diverges from AP award balloting.

When is the NFL Top 100 released each year? The 2026 rollout started June 22 with two names per weekday through Aug. 21, then shifted to one player per weekday from Aug. 24 to Sept. 4 for the top 10.

Has anyone ever repeated at No. 1? Yes, twice. Tom Brady was voted No. 1 four times (2011, 2017, 2018 and 2022) and Patrick Mahomes twice (2021 and 2023). No other player has done it more than once.

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