Brush up the NBA overtime rules as 2025-26 regular season tips off in less than a week.
Overtime or extra-time is a reliable tie-breaking method used in various sports, to decide the winner if a game ends with identical score of both teams. As other sports, extra time in the NBA is allocated in a game to battle it out for the winner in case the game has ended with the score tied. Be it a regular game or a playoff battle, overtime is where epic battles take place and every possession counts.
As the 2025-26 regular season kicks off within a week, let’s revisit the overtime rules of the NBA.
In the NBA, overtime could be defined as a five-minute period played after the end of the regulation time in case the score is tied. The overtime in the NBA, as other sports, is used to determine a winner since the game cannot end in a draw. If the score is still tied after the end of the first overtime, then another five-minute OT will begin. The process continues until a winner is decided at the end of the extra period.
In collegiate basketball or Olympic play, an overtime period is generally half the length of a standard quarter, which is four minutes for high school varsity.
An NBA game consists of four quarters, each of 12-minutes. If the score is tied at the end of the fourth period, extra five minutes are allocated to decide the winner. In that case, play resumes in 2:30 minutes without any change of baskets since all overtime periods are considered an extension of the second half.
Overtimes start with a jump ball in the center circle, and both teams are allowed two timeouts each. The clock also stops after every successful field goal in the last two minutes of each overtime. The overtime period is played with no sudden-death provisions, and all personal fouls are carried to the overtime period.
It is to be noted that the overtime rules for regular season games and playoff games are identical except for one rule, which is the foul limit. While in a regular-season game, a fifth foul or second foul under two minutes by a team sends the opponent to the free throw line for two shots, in case of an OT period, free throws are awarded on fourth foul or second foul under three minutes.
If the score between the teams remains tied at the end of an overtime period, another five-minute overtime period begins. The process is continued until one team has a lead at the end of the extra period. There is no such limit to the number of OTs that can be used to determine a winner. However, one needs to keep in mind that if a game that needed two overtime periods to finish is said to have needed “double overtime”, “triple overtime” in case of three overtime periods, and so on.
According to the Guinness World Records, a clash between the Indianapolis Olympians and the Rochester Royals in 1951 is said to be the longest game in the NBA. The game that saw Indianapolis register a 75-73 victory had as many as six overtimes. It lasted for 78 minutes, 48 minutes of regulation play and 30 minutes of six overtimes.
There is no limited decided to the number of overtime periods in NBA. If the score is still tied after one overtime period, another 5-minute overtime begins. This continues until a winner is decided. It is to be noted that games in the NBA don’t end in a tie, irrespective of the overtimes needed.
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