Why are the 49ers the away team for the Super Bowl? How are the home and away teams decided?

The San Francisco 49ers have been designed as the away team at Super Bowl LVIII, with the Kansas City Chiefs the “hosts” for Sunday’s game, which will, of course, be played at a neutral venue. Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, home of the Raiders, is where the action will take place, so why are the two contenders said to be the “home” or “away” teams?

What are benefits of being the home or away team?

The main advantage of being named the home team is that you get to choose which colour jersey you wear, likely to be a pretty big deal given how superstitious sportspeople generally are. The Chiefs have opted to play in their traditional red in Nevada, although their record is five previous Super Bowls is fairly mixed no matter what attire they were wearing.

The away team, meanwhile, calls the coin toss ahead of the start of the game, which some would argue appears more significant than what colour jersey a team wears. But what does the data show? Well, it turns out there isn’t too much correlation between winning and losing.

The simple criteria used to decide Super Bowl home and away teams

In the other rounds of the NFL playoffs, teams who have performed better earlier in the comPetition are rewarded by playing at home, with the Niners playing both their divisional playoff and the NFC Championship Game at Levi’s Stadium as a result of winning NFC West and being the top seed in their conference.

There is no such criteria for the Super Bowl itself, however, and deciding the “home” and “away” teams could hardly be simpler.

Unlike before kickoff, it’s not a case of tossing a coin. Rather the choice of hosts alternates between AFC and NFC Champions. To put it simply, the AFC champions are designated the home team in even numbered years while the NFC champions are the home team in odd numbered years.

That depends on the year in which the Super Bowl is played and not which season it relates to, so the Chiefs, AFC Champions after defeating the Baltimore Ravens a fortnight ago, will be the home team in 2024, 12 months after defeating the Philadelphia Eagles in Phoenix as the away team.