American Football Conference

American Football Conference

American Football Conference logo (2010–present)
League	National Football League
Sport	American football
Formerly	American Football League (AFL)
Founded	1970
Teams
No. of teams	16
Championships
Most recent American Football Conference champion(s)	New England Patriots (9 Titles)
Most American Football Conference titles	New England Patriots (9 titles)

The American Football Conference (AFC) is one of the two conferences of the National Football League (NFL), the highest professional level of American football in the United States. This conference and its counterpart, the National Football Conference (NFC), currently contain 16 teams each, making up the 32 teams of the NFL. Both conferences were created as part of the 1970 merger with the rival American Football League (AFL), with all ten of the former AFL teams and three NFL teams forming the AFC, and the remaining thirteen NFL clubs forming the NFC. A series of league expansions and division realignments have occurred since the merger, thus making the current total 16 clubs per each conference.

Since the 1970 AFL–NFL merger, the New England Patriots have won nine AFC titles, the most of any team in the conference (and of any team in either conference since the merger), and are its current title holder.

Since 2002, the AFC has 16 teams, organized into four divisions each with four teams: East, North, South and West.

Currently, the thirteen opponents each team faces over the 16-game regular season schedule are set using a pre-determined formula:

Each AFC team plays the other teams in their respective division twice (home and away) during the regular season, in addition to 10 other games assigned to their schedule by the NFL. Two of these games are assigned on the basis of a particular team's final divisional standing from the previous season. The remaining 8 games are split between the roster of two other NFL divisions. This assignment shifts each year and will follow a standard cycle. Using the 2012 regular season schedule as an example, each team in the AFC West plays against every team in the AFC North and NFC South. In this way, non-divisional competition will be mostly among common opponents – the exception being the two games assigned based on the team's prior-season divisional standing.

At the end of each season, the top six teams in the conference proceeds into the playoff. These teams consist of the four division winners and the top two wild card teams. The AFC playoffs culminate in the AFC Championship Game with the winner receiving the Lamar Hunt Trophy. The AFC Champion then plays the NFC Champion in the Super Bowl.