INDIANAPOLIS — The slate the Colts are facing in 2026 is harder than it seems.
Indianapolis is facing only six teams that made the playoffs in 2025, tied for the second fewest of any team in the NFL, and the Colts’ 2026 opponents had a combined winning percentage of just .465, tied for the fourth-lowest mark in the NFL.
But those numbers are misleading.
The Colts’ schedule, released Thursday night, is full of sleeping giants. Indianapolis opens with Baltimore and two-time MVP quarterback Lamar Jackson, takes on three-time Super Bowl winner Patrick Mahomes a week later and faces two NFC East teams, Washington and Dallas, that have reason to believe they can be contenders this season.
How it all shakes out will likely depend on the health of Daniel Jones and Lou Anarumo’s ability to get more out of the Indianapolis defense than the Colts produced down the stretch in 2025.
With that in mind, here’s a look at the stuff that jumps out of the schedule Indianapolis is facing in 2026.
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The Colts will play in prime time.
Indianapolis hasn’t always gotten a chance to play in prime time. Only five teams (Jacksonville, Carolina, Cleveland, Arizona and Tennessee) have played fewer prime time games than the 24 the Colts have played in the past decade.
The NFL gave the Colts chances in 2026. Indianapolis plays on NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” against Kansas City on Sept. 20, and the Colts take on the Texans on Amazon Prime’s “Thursday Night Football” on Nov. 19.
But both of those games on the road, and as bad as the NFL has been at giving Indianapolis games in prime time, it’s been even worse at scheduling those games at Lucas Oil Stadium. The Colts have played only eight prime time games at Lucas Oil in the last 10 years, the second-fewest of any team in the NFL, trailing only Jacksonville.
Indianapolis has made the playoffs only twice during that span, a reality that partially explains why the Colts haven’t played much on prime time, but that doesn’t explain why two-thirds of the prime time games involving the Colts have happened on the road. The location of a prime time game does not matter; the national television audience will watch no matter where the game’s played.
Pass rush tested early
Unable to land Trey Hendrickson in free agency, the Colts are going to try to piece together a pass rush that they hope will be led by DeForest Buckner coming off a neck injury and Laiatu Latu fully realizing his potential in his third NFL season.
The schedule makes those guys work for their sacks early.
Indianapolis opens the season at home against Jackson, Mahomes in Kansas City in the second week and gets Washington quarterback Jayden Daniels in London two weeks later. Only Houston’s C.J. Stroud, who makes the trip to Lucas Oil on Sept. 27, isn’t known as a scrambler.
Jackson, Mahomes and Daniels all have well-deserved reputations as some of the most elusive quarterbacks in the NFL, but there are mitigating circumstances.
First of all, Mahomes is coming off a torn ACL suffered in mid-December, and although the Chiefs are optimistic that their quarterback will be back for the start of the season, he may not be as mobile as he usually is. If that’s the case, expect Kansas City to use a quick-hitting passing game, a test of a different kind for a pass rush.
The other mitigating factor is that for all of their elusiveness, all three quarterbacks sometimes run themselves into sacks while looking for the big play. Jackson was sacked on 10.65% of his dropbacks last season, the second most of any full-time NFL starter, and Daniels ended up at 8.74%, placing him in the bottom third of the league. Mahomes finished with a sack percentage of 6.34%, squarely in the middle of the NFL.
But that doesn’t mean it is easy to bring any of those quarterbacks down, making the early going a difficult test for a revamped pass rush.
Opportunity in October and November
When the Colts fly back from London to finish off a difficult four-game stretch to open the season, there will be an opportunity to go on a run.
Even though Indianapolis has to travel to two places that seem cursed by this point.
From Oct. 11 until a Thursday night game against Houston on Nov. 19, the Colts defense faces a string of uncertain quarterback situations, save for a trip to Jacksonville and a home game against Dallas.
Pittsburgh is still waiting on an answer from Aaron Rodgers, Cam Ward’s in his second season at Tennessee, Minnesota is expected to go with Kyler Murray over J.J. McCarthy, and the Dolphins are trotting out a roster bereft of big names behind free-agent quarterback Malik Willis. Dak Prescott is a perennial star for Dallas, but the Cowboys’ defense remains an enormous question mark after replacing Matt Eberflus with 34-year-old Christian Parker this offseason.
A trip to the cursed city of Jacksonville sits in the middle of all those games.
But that stretch in the middle represents a chance for the Colts to get on a run.
No time for jet lag
The Colts will not have an idle week immediately after the team’s game in London against the Commanders.
The Colts will fly back home after that game in Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, go through a normal week of practice and get back on the plane for a short flight to one of the franchise’s House of Horrors on Oct. 11. Indianapolis hasn’t won a game in Pittsburgh since 2008, a streak that was left intact last season when the Colts inexplicably turned it over six times at Acrisure Stadium.
There is a silver lining to the NFL’s decision.
Unlike the last two international trips with Shane Steichen at the helm, the flight across the pond comes early in the season, rather than in November. An idle week after the London trip would mean 13 weeks without a break until the end of the season, a grueling gauntlet. Indianapolis instead takes its bye at the beginning of December, offering players a chance to get healthy for the stretch run.
This also isn’t the first time the Colts have returned from a European trip with a game on the docket the next week. Indianapolis bounced back from a loss to Jacksonville at London’s Wembley Stadium in 2016 by beating Chicago at Lucas Oil Stadium the next week.
Freezing finish?
The Colts have not played in a lot of cold weather recently.
There was a high temperature of 36 degrees for the team’s win over New England in 2024, a high of 34 for the team’s last playoff appearance at the end of the 2021 season and a high of 37 degrees in Pittsburgh, two weeks before that wild-card game in Buffalo.
The last time Indianapolis played in a game where the temperature didn’t get above freezing was the Colts’ playoff loss to the Chiefs in the divisional round at the end of the 2018 season, a high of 32 degrees the day after a snowstorm blanketed Kansas City.
There is potential for Indianapolis to be put in a freezer at the end of 2026, even with an El Niño likely to produce a mild winter. The Colts play on the road in Philadelphia on Dec. 13, a place where there is always potential for cold, and a Dec. 20 trip to Nashville to take on the Titans carries the possibility of a cold snap.
The real threat, though, comes after New Year’s Day.
Indianapolis has to make a Jan. 3 trip to Cleveland, a place notorious for its winter weather because of the wind and snow that whips off Lake Erie in the winter. Indianapolis hasn’t played a snow game since that playoff game in Kansas City, and the Colts haven’t played in the middle of a snowstorm since the famous 2017 game in Buffalo. If it’s going to happen this season, Cleveland seems like the best bet.
Joel A. Erickson and Nathan Brown cover the Colts all season. Get more coverage on IndyStarTV and with the Colts Insider newsletter.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: 5 observations from the Colts’ deceptively tough 2026 schedule
Reporting by Joel A. Erickson, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
