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Remember when college athletes were amateurs? Those days are long, long gone. Last year, college football players were estimated to have earned $1 billion. This year, that number is projected to go up to $1.9 billion. And it’s just going to keep growing.
According to a a new report from NIL data platform Opendorse, College Football Kickoff: How NIL is Reshaping the Game in 2025, in 2021, college football players earned approximately $393 million through NIL. Last year, Opendorse estimated college football players earned $853.1 million from NIL deals that were set up by by school collectives and another $150.5 million from other deals.
In 2025, the amount of money college football players will earn through school NIL collectives is expected to drop to “just” $213.4 million. Money from those “other” commercial deals is projected to go up to $290 million. So where is the other $1.4 billion coming from?
Revenue sharing
It will be coming from the $20.5 million of revenue athletic departments are each now allowed to share with their athletes. When it is all added up, according to the Opendorse report, that’s another $1.4 billion for college football players, bringing the total to around $1.9 billion. In 2026, that number is expected to go up to $2.4 billion for college football players and then up to $2.6 billion in 2027.
As far as which college football positions will receive the most money from revenue sharing, perhaps not surprisingly, it’s the quarterbacks.
• Quarterbacks: 18%
• Receivers: 15.13%
• Offensive linemen: 14.35%
• Defensive linemen: 13.1%
• Defensive backs: 12.23%
• Linebackers: 10.75%
• Running Backs: 9.67%
Transfers and high school players
Interestingly, as Forbes points out, “Athletes who transferred during the December window saw their earnings rise by 61.5%, while those in the spring portal window saw a 13.6% increase.”
It’s not just college football players that will be raking in some big money in 2025. With high schools officially permitted to give NIL and revenue-sharing offers to high school recruits as of Aug. 1, Opendorse projects $328 million in offers will made to high school prospects just in the month of August.
Not everyone is getting rich though. According to Forbes, only 0.3% of college football players will make $1 million. Most, 66.5%, will earn less than $10,000 a year, while 7.4% will earn between $50,000 and $99,000.