Best College Football Stadiums, Ranked

College football stadiums are some of the most iconic sports venues in the world.

Best College Football Stadiums, Ranked

College football has never been more popular than it is today — a sports monolith generating billions of dollars each year with rabid fanbases from coast to coast.

For each college football team, so much of their identity is wrapped up in where they play their home games. Some of the stadiums that play home to the very best teams in the nation take on iconic identities forged, in some cases, thanks to over a century of football games played there.

If you're a true college football fan, many of the most well-known stadiums have probably found their way onto your sports bucket list of places to visit before you die.

Here's a look at the best college football stadiums in the U.S., ranked.

25. Milan Puskar Stadium (West Virginia)

Location: Morgantown, West Virginia

Capacity: 60,000

Opened: 1980

Bottom Line: Milan Puskar Stadium

Toss aside all the couch-burning and moonshine jokes about West Virginia football, and you have a consistently above-average football program with a stadium that is the focal point of the entire state on game days.

Take this into account — during games when Milan Puskar Stadium is at its listed capacity of 60,000, it has a higher population than either of the state's two largest cities of Charleston (48,864) and Huntington (46,842). Which is pretty awesome.

24. Folsom Field (Colorado)

Location: Boulder, Colorado

Capacity: 50,183

Opened: 1924

Bottom Line: Folsom Field

The big-swing, hot-take addition to this list is Colorado's Folsom Field. Despite coming off a season in which the Buffs went 1-11, you cannot deny the buzz that's been building in Boulder with the hiring of head coach Deion Sanders. College football old-heads understand what an absolute joy it was to watch games here in Colorado's glory years in the 1980s and 1990s. The hiring of Sanders sparked a ticket-buying frenzy that saw season tickets sell out for just the ninth time in school history.

That said, Colorado also has one of the great traditions in college football with Ralphie, the live buffalo mascot for the school that gets to run around the field with handlers before and at halftime of each game.

23. Albertsons Stadium (Boise State)

Location: Boise, Idaho

Capacity: 36,387

Opened: 1970

Bottom Line: Albertsons Stadium

Yes, the blue turf at Boise State's Albertsons Stadium is awesome and almost worth the trip alone. But if the team that played on it sucked, the blue turf would just be an oddity.

Thankfully, Boise State has been one of college football's best programs over the last 25 years. Since their last losing season in 1997, the Broncos have gone undefeated twice, had six one-loss seasons and won at least 10 games in a season 18 times. You don't have that type of success without having a great home fanbase and a great home stadium.

22. Rice-Eccles Stadium (Utah)

Location: Salt Lake City, Utah

Capacity: 51,444

Opened: 1998

Bottom Line: Rice-Eccles Stadium

The newest stadium on this list, Utah's Rice-Eccles Stadium has been home to some pretty wonderful football over the last 25 years — remember that Utah was the first team outside of the Power Five Conferences to receive a bid to a BCS bowl game.

You have to have a pretty amazing fanbase to move from a mid-major conference (WAC) to a better mid-major conference (MWC) to a Power Five (Pac-12) to another Power Five (Big 12), and that's all happened since Rice-Eccles opened.

21. Husky Stadium (Washington)

Location: Seattle, Washington

Capacity: 70,138

Opened: 1920

Bottom Line: Husky Stadium

Husky Stadium has been home to Washington's football team for over a century and has seen some pretty amazing football — most notably a pair of national championships in 1960 and 1991.

What's more unique about Husky Stadium is, even if you take out all of that winning, you still have a pretty amazing place to watch a football game with its U-shaped design opening up to views of Lake Washington and the Cascade Mountains. So many vibes.

20. LaVell Edwards Stadium (BYU)

Location: Provo, Utah

Capacity: 63,470

Opened: 1964

Bottom Line: LaVell Edwards Stadium

Renamed for former head football coach LaVell Edwards upon his last home game in 2000, BYU's home field has been part of big-time college football moments long before joining the Big 12 in 2023.

If you want to know something about BYU fans, take into account that Cougar home games have had the largest average home attendance for any college football team in the West — including Pac-12 schools — since 2021.

19. Nile Kinnick Stadium (Iowa)

Location: Iowa City, Iowa

Capacity: 69,251

Opened: 1929

Bottom Line: Nile Kinnick Stadium

Iowa has the only college football stadium named for a Heisman Trophy winner — Nile Kinnick won the award in 1939 and died fighting in World War II.

The football here has been good to pretty great over its lifetime — hardly ever truly bad — and games here took on a new meaning beginning in 2017. That's when fans turned their phones on and waved at the kids in The University of Iowa Children's Hospital, which overlooks the field.

18. Camp Randall Stadium (Wisconsin)

Location: Madison, Wisconsin

Capacity: 80,321

Opened: 1917

Bottom Line: Camp Randall Stadium

In over 100 years of football at Camp Randall Stadium, there's one tradition that overshadows all others and is among the greatest in all of sports.

Since 1993, when Wisconsin plays home games, House of Pain's "Jump Around" plays between the end of the third quarter and the start of the fourth quarter, and the student section becomes the only place in the universe. That's goosebumps time in Madison. What a wonderful feeling.

17. Doak Campbell Stadium (Florida State)

Location: Tallahassee, Florida

Capacity: 79,560

Opened: 1950

Bottom Line: Doak Campbell Stadium

Florida State football has very much been in flux over the last five years, but if you were paying attention to college football at the end of the 2022 regular season, you got to see Doak Campbell Stadium at its full power. After all, this is the place that made a whole generation fall in love with college football in the early 1990s.

When it's really hot outside and the football is good, you can't beat seeing a game here.

16. Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium (Oklahoma)

Location: Norman, Oklahoma

Capacity: 80,126

Opened: 1923

Bottom Line: Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium

While some might have reservations about Oklahoma ending its 103-year association with the Big 12 Conference following the 2023 season, it's not much of a stretch to think home games will still be super-duper lit at Gaylor Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium with a recurring roster of SEC teams coming to visit.

This is a great place to watch college football — if the team is average or bad like they were in 2022, that could change quickly. We'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now.

15. Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium (Texas)

Location: Austin, Texas

Capacity: 100,119

Opened: 1924

Bottom Line: Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium

The official capacity for Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium might be listed at just a smidge more than 100,000, but the Longhorns managed to squeeze just more than 105,000 for a game against Alabama in September 2022 — an enticing look at what life will be like when Texas joins the SEC in 2024.

This is the marquee stadium for the marquee college football program in the state where football matters the most. All that's missing now is a good team.

14. Autzen Stadium (Oregon)

Location: Eugene, Oregon

Capacity: 54,000

Opened: 1967

Bottom Line: Autzen Stadium

A lot of the stadiums that made this list made it on vibes alone — how it makes us feel when we're tailgating or attending a game or even how we feel just watching a game on television. Oregon's Autzen Stadium has amazing vibes.

While vibes are one thing, having a great football team is another, and Oregon becoming one of the nation's best teams over the last 20 years contributes to that. It also contributes to the school being able to justify upgrades to Autzen and Nike being able to justify making a unique uniform for every single game.

13. Ben Hill Griffin Stadium (Florida)

Location: Gainesville, Florida

Capacity: 88,548

Opened: 1930

Bottom Line: Ben Hill Griffin Stadium

If you watched Netflix's documentary, "Swamp Kings," on the Urban Meyer years at Florida, you got to see what "The Swamp" is like in all of its steamy glory.

While there haven't been many opportunities in recent years for Florida fans to really stretch the limits of Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, you have to give them credit for coming back to the Gators no matter what. They're the Nebraska fans of the south.

12. Neyland Stadium (Tennessee)

Location: Knoxville, Tennessee

Capacity: 101,915

Opened: 1921

Bottom Line: Neyland Stadium

The full power of Tennessee's Neyland Stadium was finally on display for all to see when the Vols took down No. 3 Alabama at home in 2022. Tennessee's first win over the Crimson Tide since 2006 resulted in both goalposts being torn down and thrown in the Tennessee River along with a $100,000 fine from the SEC for fans storming the field.

Tennessee fans donated $152,000 in the following 24 hours to pay the fine and replace the goalposts. Neyland Stadium's not higher on this list only because football at Tennessee has been objectively awful for most of the last 20 years — a stretch that includes nine losing seasons and three more seasons when the Vols finished just one game over .500.

11. Michigan Stadium (Michigan)

Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan

Capacity: 107,601

Opened: 1927

Bottom Line: Michigan Stadium

Michigan football is once again among the nation's elite teams — the stadium it plays in took no such break.

Remember going to see a game here isn't just a unique experience for college football because of its capacity seating of over 107,000 fans. It's a unique experience because you're in one of the biggest stadiums in the entire world.

10. Bryant-Denny Stadium (Alabama)

Location: Tuscaloosa, Alabama

Capacity: 101,821

Opened: 1929

Bottom Line: Bryant-Denny Stadium

There's nothing particularly attractive about Bryant-Denny Stadium in its physical appearance — it's pretty bland architecture — but the team that plays here will really blow your mind.

Under head coach Nick Saban, Alabama has won six of its 18 national championships in the last 14 years, creating perhaps the greatest dynasty in college football history.

9. Kyle Field (Texas A&M)

Location: College Station, Texas

Capacity: 102,733

Opened: 1927

Bottom Line: Kyle Field

There's a grey area between listed capacity and how many people a stadium can actually fit if it were stretched to its outermost parameters. This was never more underlined than by Texas A&M's Kyle Field packing just over 110,000 fans in for a game against Ole Miss in 2014 — some 8,000 more fans than its listed capacity.

While some of us might say, "Hey, that might not be the smartest thing to do," please remember … this is Texas. They do what they want, building and fire codes be damned.

8. Memorial Stadium (Clemson)

Location: Clemson, South Carolina

Capacity: 82,000

Opened: 1942

Bottom Line: Memorial Stadium

Few experiences in college football can compare to going to Death Valley — the nickname of Clemson's stadium — and seeing the team stand perched above the field at Howard's Rock, ready to "Run Down the Hill" before a game.

Made famous when Brent Musburger referred to it as "the most exciting 25 seconds in college football" in 1985, it's taken on even more meaning since Dabo Swinney took over as head coach in 2008. Since then, the Tigers have won two national championships, been national runner-up two more times and won eight ACC titles.

7. Memorial Stadium (Nebraska)

Location: Lincoln, Nebraska

Capacity: 85,458

Opened: 1923

Bottom Line: Memorial Stadium

The most loyal fans in college football belong to the Nebraska Cornhuskers, who have stayed with the team despite abandoning almost a century's worth of rivalries and traditions when they went to the Big Ten and despite being below average to bad over the last decade.

To underline that point, Nebraska has sold out every game since 1962.

6. Jordan-Hare Stadium (Auburn)

Location: Auburn, Alabama

Capacity: 88,043

Opened: 1939

Bottom Line: Jordan-Hare Stadium

Few stadiums on this list can say what would happen if you packed them full of people and stress-tested that capacity seating by having the most bananas thing that could possibly happen occur — which is what happened on Nov. 30, 2013, at Jordan-Hare Stadium when Auburn's Chris Davis returned a missed field goal 109 yards as time expired to defeat No. 1 Alabama in the Iron Bowl.

It's the greatest finish to a college football game ever and arguably the greatest finish to any football game ever. And it happened at Jordan-Hare!

5. Ohio Stadium (Ohio State)

Location: Columbus, Ohio

Capacity: 102,780

Opened: 1922

Bottom Line: Ohio Stadium

"The Horseshoe" has some of the most aesthetically pleasing architecture in college football — if we're going to describe the look of any stadium as epic, it'd be this one.

But one weird fact about Ohio Stadium is that the Buckeyes weren't able to play regular night games for the first 92 years of playing here until permanent lighting was installed in 2014.

4. Sanford Stadium (Georgia)

Georgia senior defensive end Garrison Smith at Sanford Stadium

Location: Athens, Georgia

Capacity: 92,746

Opened: 1929

Bottom Line: Sanford Stadium

The things that make a great college football stadium seem mostly composed of several quickly distinguishable elements, all of which you can find at Georgia's Sanford Stadium.

Unique features? The privet hedges around the field are among the most recognizable in-stadium accouterments in all of sports, not just college football. Playing games "between the hedges" is a sports colloquialism we all know.

Great aesthetics? The west end of the stadium opens up to the campus and the rolling Georgia hills.

Great team? Georgia has won back-to-back College Football Playoff national championships headed into the 2023 season and has had just one losing season in the last 25 years.

3. Beaver Stadium (Penn State)

Location: University Park, Pennsylvania

Capacity: 106,572

Opened: 1959

Bottom Line: Beaver Stadium

If we're going totally binary, the thing to point out about Penn State's Beaver Stadium is it's the fourth-largest stadium in the entire world, which is amazing.

If we're going off pure vibes, turn on your television on a Saturday and watch Beaver Stadium during a whiteout game. It's one of the more amazing home-field advantages a team can have, which makes playing here a nightmare for opposing teams.

2. Tiger Stadium (LSU)

Location: Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Capacity: 102,321

Opened: 1924

Bottom Line: Tiger Stadium

According to legend, LSU picked purple and gold as its colors before its first game in 1893 — a 34-0 loss to Tulane in New Orleans in front of a crowd of around 1,000 — because those were Mardi Gras colors and because the team distinguished its colors with ribbons and the green ribbons were sold out.

Games for LSU are a much different experience in 2023. Fans who visit Tiger Stadium will literally feel the earth move underneath their feet when the 102,000-plus in attendance get warmed up. So, if you want to understand what college football means in the South, go to an LSU home game. Or just watch this video of Heisman Trophy winner Joe Burrow's entrance into the stadium on Senior Night.

1. Notre Dame Stadium (Notre Dame)

Location: South Bend, Indiana

Capacity: 77,622

Opened: 1929

Bottom Line: Notre Dame Stadium

As Notre Dame Stadium closes in on its 100th anniversary, it still retains kind of a mythical status among college football stadiums. How many stadiums on this list can you really call "bucket list" trips? Not many. And Notre Dame Stadium is at the top of the list.

Go see a game when it's cold. Ply yourself with hot cocoa ... or whatever liquid you think will keep you warm. Take a pick with Rudy outside of the bookstore. You won't regret it.