The Indianapolis Colts have a much more favorable schedule for the upcoming season compared to last year, at least in terms of miles traveled.
Their schedule is nearly identical to last year’s when it comes to strength of schedule, a .465 combined opponent win percentage for 2026, whereas it was .464 in 2025. Despite the similar win rates, the Colts’ schedule has been deemed the 4th-easiest for 2026 and was the 8th-easiest a season ago.
Outside of their annual six-game slate against the AFC South, the Colts will face off against the AFC North and NFC East in 2026. Below are their opponents for the upcoming season, with some games already being confirmed ahead of the official schedule release that drops later this evening at 8 PM EST on NFL Network.
HOME: Houston Texans, Tennessee Titans, Jacksonville Jaguars, Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, Cincinnati Bengals, Miami Dolphins, Baltimore Ravens
AWAY: Houston Texans, Tennessee Titans, Jacksonville Jaguars, Minnesota Vikings, Kansas City Chiefs, Pittsburgh Steelers, Cleveland Browns, Washington Commanders, Philadelphia Eagles
The strength of schedule based on final records from the previous season is just one exercise to determine a team’s challenge level for their upcoming slate of regular-season games. The aforementioned travel schedule is another layer that helps us see what each team is up against.
Bill Speros of bookies.com calculated the mileage traveled for each NFL team this upcoming season using the linear air distance between each stadium via Google Earth.
The Colts are traveling a projected 15,868 miles in the 2026 regular season, the 22nd-most among all NFL teams. This is a welcome reversal of last season’s total mileage, a schedule that had the Colts in the top 10 of most miles traveled.
Last season, Indianapolis had the 7th-most miles traveled. The Colts traveled 25,089 miles in 2025, crossing 36 time zones throughout the year. This proved to be a tough challenge for the 2025 Colts, a team that began to fall apart following their trip to Berlin, Germany, in Week 10, which had them sitting at 8-2 entering their bye week.
Indianapolis’ biggest travel day in 2026 will come in Week 4 when they head across the pond to take on the Washington Commanders in London, UK. This round trip adds a projected ~8,000 miles to their total, which is more than half of their projection for the season.
Had their ‘away’ game been in Washington as opposed to an international matchup in London, the Colts would’ve shaved off nearly 7,000 miles and been firmly in the bottom five of total miles traveled.
Indianapolis is 3rd among AFC South teams that will travel the most in 2026, sitting below the Houston Texans and Jacksonville Jaguars, each of which is set to travel over 20,000 miles. It may not seem like a needle-mover in terms of overall impact, but the Colts need any edge they can get if they want to finally win the division under general manager Chris Ballard.
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