The 1990 NFL season was the 71st regular season of the National Football League. To increase revenue, the league, for the first time since 1966, reinstated bye weeks, so that all NFL teams would play their 16-game schedule over a 17-week period. Furthermore, the playoff format was expanded from 10 teams to 12 teams by adding another wild card from each conference, thus adding two more contests to the postseason schedule; this format was modified with realignment in 2002 (increasing the division spots per conference from three to four, and decreasing the wild card spots per conference from three to two) before the playoffs expanded to 14 teams in 2020. During four out of the five previous seasons under the 10-team format, at least one team with a 10–6 record missed the playoffs, including t