Major League Soccer is kicking off its 30th season this weekend, but as the league’s 30th and newest team posted on social media, it’s “Season 1, Week 1” for San Diego FC.
Some soccer fans have been paying attention to the league since it was founded in December 1993 — just a few months before the United States hosted the 1994 World Cup — or from April 6, 1996, when the San Jose Clash defeated D.C. United in the first game.
Others might date their fandom to a more recent date, such as the 2007 season when England legend David Beckham signed with the Los Angeles Galaxy. Or maybe just a year ago when arguably the greatest player in the sport’s history, Lionel Messi, ed Inter Miami.
Or, perhaps, since San Diego never had a team, this is the first time some fans ever really noticed MLS.
With all that in mind (but mostly for the newcomers), here is a rundown of what the league is, who plays in it, how to watch it and more as SDFC prepares for its first match at 4 p.m. Sunday in Carson against the Galaxy.
The league
There are 30 teams, triple the number from the inaugural season, divided into two conferences.
The Western Conference consists of Austin FC, Colorado Rapids, FC Dallas, Houston Dynamo FC, LA Galaxy, Los Angeles FC (LAFC), Minnesota United FC, Portland Timbers, Real Salt Lake, San Diego FC, San Jose Earthquakes, Seattle Sounders FC, Sporting Kansas City, St. Louis City SC and Vancouver Whitecaps FC.
The Eastern Conference: Atlanta United FC, Charlotte FC, Chicago Fire FC, FC Cincinnati, Columbus Crew, D.C. United, Inter Miami CF, CF Montreal, Nashville SC, New England Revolution, New York City FC, New York Red Bulls, Orlando City FC, Philadelphia Union and Toronto FC.
MLS is ranked as the ninth-best world league, according to the Opta Power Rankings, which consider the average power rating for each club in each league. England’s Premier League is first, followed by Italy’s Serie A, ’s Bundesliga, Spain’s La Liga, ’s Ligue 1, Brazil’s Serie A, Portugal’s Premier Liga and Belgium’s Jupiter Pro League. At No. 9, MLS is ranked just ahead of the English Championship. Mexico’s first-division league, Liga MX, is No. 13.
The schedule
The regular season consists of 34 games from this weekend until mid-October. Each team plays home and away against every team in its own conference, and then three home and three road games against teams from the other conference. San Diego FC’s crossover home games are against Columbus, Nashville and Toronto, with road contests at Atlanta, Charlotte and Chicago.
Most games kick off at 7:30 local time on Wednesdays and Saturdays, though the league usually has one or two earlier games each Saturday and one or two games each Sunday.
Three points are awarded for a victory, one for a tie (yes, there are ties in the regular season). Unlike many worldwide leagues, at the end of the season the team with the most points is not crowned champion and given a parade. Instead, it is awarded the ers’ Shield and granted home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. (Just eight teams have won the Shield and the MLS Cup in the same season, most recently LAFC in 2022.)
The playoff format has not been announced for the 2025 season. Last year’s format, which featured best-of-three series in the opening round with no aggregate score kept, was roundly criticized by players and fans.
Of the 29 teams that preceded SDFC, 15 have won at least one MLS Cup. LA Galaxy leads the way with six, including the most recent. D.C. United has won four (all in the first nine seasons) and Columbus Crew three.
The extra games
MLS might be unlike its counterparts around most of the world in respect to playoffs, but it is similar in one way: It does not limit its clubs to one competition each season. Eighteen MLS teams — including San Diego FC — also will compete this season in Leagues Cup 2025, which features interleague matches against 18 teams from Mexico’s Liga MX. Each team will play three matches between July 29 and Aug. 7. (SDFC will host Pachuca, Tigres and Mazatlan at Snapdragon Stadium.) The top four teams from each league will advance, with the final on Aug. 31.
Separately, the Concacaf Champions Cup began play this month; it includes 10 teams from MLS (but not SDFC) and Liga MX as well as Canada, Central America and the Caribbean.
Two MLS teams, Miami and Seattle, are competing in the new FIFA Club World Cup, which starts in June. And other teams, yet to be determined, will play in the U.S. Open Cup.
Oh, and the annual MLS All-Star Game will be played July 23 in Austin.
The players
Each team is allowed up to 30 players on its active roster. How those players arrive at their teams is as varied as it is complicated.
Up to 20 players count against the salary budget of $5.95 million and are referred to as the club’s Senior Roster. The maximum salary budget charge for any one player is $743,750 (but that doesn’t mean a player can’t earn more than that).
All the rules are available at mlssoccer.com, but here’s a quick summary to show how complicated it can be: “In addition to the Salary Budget, each MLS club may spend additional funds on player compensation including money from a League-wide allocation pool (General Allocation Money), discretionary amounts of Targeted Allocation Money, the cost of Designated Players outside the Salary Budget, the cost of U22 Initiative Slots outside the Salary Budget, and money spent on the Supplemental Roster (roster slots 21-31).”
Other things to know:
• Since the number of international roster slots is limited to 241 over the 30 teams (though slots can be traded), it behooves teams to have as many players as possible qualify as domestic players. Those are either U.S. citizens, permanent residents, those with refugee or asylum status or anyone who qualifies under what MLS calls “the Homegrown International Rule” — he signed with an MLS club academy no later than the year in which he turned 15, and he signed his first pro contract with MLS or an MLS .
• A rule allows clubs to acquire up to three “Designated Players” whose total compensation and acquisition costs exceed the $743,750 charge mentioned above. It is this rule that allowed SDFC to bring in Mexican legend Chucky Lozano and Danish winger Anders Dreyer. Lozano’s transfer fee was reportedly $12 million, while Dreyer’s was $5 million. Both reportedly will earn more than $6 million in salary.
• For the first time in 2025, MLS clubs can buy players from each other for cash (which is how it works around the world). In the past, only draft picks or allocation money could be traded for a player already in the league.
• Rosters can be changed from now until April 23, and again once the secondary transfer window opens from July 24 through Aug. 21. One long-rumored move expected this summer: French international star Antoine Greizmann will leave Atletico Madrid for LAFC.
The stars
One star shines above the rest: Messi. Unfortunately for fans in San Diego, Inter Miami — which also features the likes of Luis Suarez, Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets — will play its three interconference road matches this season in Houston, Minnesota and San Jose.
LAFC, which will be in San Diego at the end of March, has a pair of French stars, Olivier Giroud and Denis Bouanga. Giroud is ’s all-time leading goal scorer and a World Cup winner in 2018, but he’s 38 and failed to score for LAFC last season in 14 regular season and postseason matches. Bouanga, 30, has 49 goals and 18 assists in 82 regular season and postseason games in MLS.
Seattle features three U.S. Men’s National Team players including Chula Vista’s Paul Arriola, who s Jordan Morris and Jesus Ferreira on a team that could be the favorite in the Western Conference.
Others in the West to watch here: Austin’s Brandon Vasquez, another player from Chula Vista who has appeared for the USMNT, and Myrto Uzuni, a top scorer in Spain’s second division; Kelvin Yeboah, who had seven goals in just nine games last season after ing Minnesota United; Luciano Acosta, the 2023 league MVP who was traded from Cincinnati to Dallas, and Dejan Joveljic, who scored 15 goals last season for the Galaxy but is now with Kansas City.
The TV deal
We’ll get to the bottom line first: If you want to see the vast majority of MLS matches, you’ll have to pay more than your usual monthly fee for cable, satellite or streaming. Just 34 of the 510 regular season MLS games are available on linear TV channels — 19 on Fox Sports 1 and 15 on Fox.
Everything else is exclusive through MLS Season , which is primarily available on Apple TV+ for $14.99 a month or $99 for the season. (Those rates are discounted to $12.99 or $79 for Apple TV+ subscribers.) DirecTV customers can purchase MLS Season through that service for the $14.99 or $99 fee. There will be a free preview for all DirecTV subscribers from this weekend through March 1.
Also new this season: MLS is showcasing a Sunday “night” match, usually at 4 p.m. PT, for all Apple TV+ subscribers, even those who don’t also have MLS Season . The telecasts will include dedicated pregame and postgame shows. The first game is SDFC’s opener Sunday in Carson
