WNBA is into its 28th season and has had a breakout season which has set new attendance records across the league and teams have shifted to NBA stadiums to facilitate the audience. The league also plans to bring in expansion teams in the Bay Area and Toronto in 2025 and Portland in 2026.
WNBA’s pool of talent is at its peak with some of the best players in the world in A’ja Wilson, Napheesa Collier, Caitlin Clark, Breanna Stewart, Alyssa Thomas and many more. Also, Sabrina Ionescu’s three-point contest against Stephen Curry at the 2024 NBA All-Stars game has brought new eyes to the WNBA. The game is growing at a rapid pace which also brings an opportunity to increase the pay in the next CBA which will result in players avoiding injury issues while playing overseas.
WNBA Playoffs Format in 2024
After going through multiple changes since the start of the WNBA, the latest playoffs format was adopted in 2022.
The new playoff format focuses on the top eight teams with the best regular-season records, regardless of their conference. This system eliminates conference-based qualifications and allows the best-performing teams to advance to the playoffs based solely on their regular season record.
In this format, first-round games are played in a best-of-three series where the first two games are hosted by the higher seed. The second round has a little tweak and the series extends to best-of-five where the first two games and game 5 are hosted by the higher seed. In the WNBA Finals, home advantage goes to the higher seed in a best-of-five series.
On one side of the bracket, the first seed faces the eighth seed and the fourth seed faces the fifth seed. On the other side of the bracket, the second seed faces the seventh seed and the third seed faces the sixth seed. To understand this by an example, let's look at the 2024 WNBA Playoffs:
| New York Liberty (1st seed) | Minnesota Lynx (2nd seed) |
| Atlanta Dream (8th seed) | Phoenix Mercury (7th seed) |
| versus | versus |
| Las Vegas Aces (4th seed) | Connecticut Sun (3rd seed) |
| Seattle Storm (5th seed) | Indiana Fever (6th seed) |
This concept replaced the step-ladder system which was introduced in 2016. In this format the first and second seeds used to enter the semi-finals, third and fourth in the second round and the remaining four used to battle in the first round.
FAQs on the format for the WNBA playoffs in 2024?
A. New expansion teams were awarded to San Francisoco Bay Area and Toronto in 2025 and Portland in 2026.
A. Eight teams with the best regular season record qualify to the WNBA Playoffs.
A. The new playoffs format was adopted in 2022 by the WNBA.
A. Sabrina Ionescu took part in the three-point contest at the 2024 All-Stars game against Stephen Curry
