How Athletic Scholarships Work Across NCAA Divisions

The old headcount and equivalency system

Until July 2025, the NCAA split Division I and II sports into two categories. Headcount sports, mainly football and basketball, gave every scholarship athlete a full ride covering tuition, fees, room, and board. Coaches could not split those awards. Equivalency sports, which covered most other sports, worked differently. The NCAA capped the total dollar value a team could hand out, and the coach divided that pool across the roster however they wanted, which meant most equivalency athletes got a partial scholarship rather than a full one.

What changed in 2025

The House v. NCAA settlement , approved in June 2025, rewrote this system. As of July 1, 2025, the NCAA dropped the headcount category entirely. Every sport in every division now runs on the equivalency model, so schools offer partial scholarships in sports like football and basketball where only full rides existed before.

The settlement also replaced sport-by-sport scholarship limits with roster caps. Football teams are now capped at 105 total roster spots, and men's basketball rosters grew from 13 to 15 players, according to reporting on the settlement's rollout. A school now offers some form of athletic aid to every player on the roster up to that cap, instead of reserving money for a fixed number of scholarship slots.

Division I: scholarships plus revenue sharing

Division I schools that opt into the settlement terms do two things at once now: distribute athletic scholarships across the full roster, and pay athletes directly through revenue sharing. For the 2025-26 academic year, participating schools share up to $20.5 million total among their athletes, a cap tied to a share of average power-conference athletics revenue that rises through the 10-year settlement term.

This means a Division I roster spot today combines a partial or full athletic scholarship with a separate revenue-share payment, on top of any NIL income the athlete earns from endorsements. The scholarship and the revenue share come from different pools and are negotiated separately.

Division II: partial scholarships, no revenue sharing

Division II never used headcount sports, so the shift to universal equivalency changed less here. D2 schools set a maximum athletic aid equivalency per sport, and coaches split it, meaning most D2 athletes on scholarship receive a partial award covering some portion of tuition, room, or board rather than the full cost. D2 schools are not part of the House settlement revenue-sharing structure, so athletes there do not receive direct pay from their school, though NIL deals with outside businesses remain available.

Division III: academic and need-based aid only

Division III is the NCAA's largest division by number of schools, and it runs on a strict no-athletics-money rule. D3 schools cannot offer financial aid based on athletic ability, full stop. A D3 athlete's financial aid package looks identical to any other student's: academic scholarships, need-based grants, and federal aid through the FAFSA. Strong students who play a sport in D3 sometimes end up with generous total aid, but none of it is tied to their athletic performance.

What this means if you are being recruited

Ask a coach directly what percentage of the equivalency scholarship they are offering, not just whether you got "a scholarship." A 25 percent award and a 90 percent award are both real offers, and the gap between them means tens of thousands of dollars a year out of your family's pocket. Compare the offer against your school's full cost of attendance, not just tuition, since room, board, and fees add up fast.