The 2026 Iowa football schedule was released on Tuesday by the Big Ten Conference. The Hawkeyes will open up Big Ten play with a trip to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to face the Michigan Wolverines on Sept. 26. 

Iowa will host in-state rival Iowa State on Sept. 12, sandwiched between home matchups with Northern Illinois on Sept. 5 and Northern Iowa on Sept. 19. 

The Hawkeyes will play seven games at Kinnick Stadium in 2026, with Family Weekend falling on the Week 3 game against UNI, and Homecoming will be on Oct. 31 against rival Wisconsin. 

Iowa is set to face off with two opponents that finished in the final Associated Press top-25 poll, with the Hawkeyes traveling to No. 21 Michigan, and No. 5 Ohio State coming to Kinnick on Oct. 3, marking just the fourth time — and the first time since 1954 — that Iowa will play the Wolverines and the Buckeyes in back-to-back weeks.

Three trophy games will be played on Iowa’s home turf, including the annual Black Friday game against Nebraska. The Hawkeyes will play for the Floyd of Rosedale in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as they look to pick up their 11th win in the last 12 games against the Gophers.

Iowa will not make a trip to the East Coast, but will travel west to face Washington in Seattle. It will be just the seventh matchup all time between the Hawkeyes and Huskies, with Iowa winning the last matchup, 40-16, in Iowa City in 2024. The November slate for the Hawkeyes includes at Northwestern on Nov. 7 at the Wildcats’ newly-built Ryan Field, followed by a home game against Purdue on the 14th. Iowa visits Champaign the following week for a matchup against Illinois. 

Iowa finished the 2025 season with a 9-4 record and was ranked No. 17 in the final AP poll, losing all four games to ranked opponents by a combined 15 points.