The Indianapolis Colts will officially gain two additional selections in the 2026 NFL draft.
On Monday, the NFL announced the 2026 compensatory picks. For the Colts, they were awarded pick No. 249 and pick No. 254, both of which are in the seventh-round.
How many draft picks do the Colts have in 2026?
These compensatory picks give the Colts seven selections in total. They were without their first-round pick after trading for Sauce Gardner, and the Colts were also without their sixth-round pick, which was used to trade for Mekhi Blackmon.
As we detailed recently, the Colts could be a team looking to trade down in this year’s draft.
What are compensatory draft picks?
Every draft, the NFL awards at least 32 additional picks for certain players who go from one team to another via free agency. In short, if a team loses more compensatory free agents than they sign, they will get a draft pick in return for the difference.
Not every free agent is a compensatory free agent; there is a formula that takes into account the playing time of that free agent, their salary, and any postseason honors they received. Essentially, the better the player, the better the draft pick that the team receives for losing them.
By Over the Cap’s calculations, the Colts gained three compensatory free agents during the 2025 offseason, signing Cam Bynum, Daniel Jones, and Charvarius Ward. However, they lost five compensatory free agents with Will Fries, Dayo Odeyingbo, Ryan Kelly, Joe Flacco, and EJ Speed signing elsewhere.
Fries and Bynum (fourth-round compensatory selections) cancel each other out. Odeyingbo and Jones (fifth-round compensatory selections), along with Kelly and Ward (sixth-round compensatory selections), cancel each other out as well.
That then leaves Flacco and Speed, landing the Colts with the two additional seventh-round picks.
When are the Colts picking in the 2026 NFL draft?
This article originally appeared on Colts Wire: Colts awarded 2 additional 2026 NFL draft picks
Reporting by Paul Bretl, Colts Wire / Colts Wire
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
