NCAA Division I FCS independent schools


NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision independent schools are four-year institutions in the United States whose football programs are not part of a football conference. This means that FCS independents are not required to schedule each other for competition as conference schools do.
As of the next college football season of 2020, four schools will play as FCS independents. Presbyterian and Robert Morris will spend only the 2020 season as independents. Presbyterian began a transition to non-scholarship FCS football in 2017 and will play the final season of that transition as an FCS independent before joining the Pioneer Football League in 2021; it remains a full but non-football member of the Big South Conference. Robert Morris left the football-sponsoring Northeast Conference for the non-football Horizon League in July 2020; it will join Big South football in 2021. Also in 2020, Dixie State and Tarleton State moved up from Division II, with both joining the non-football Western Athletic Conference. Both schools announced they would play as FCS independents for the foreseeable future.
The only school that had played as an FCS independent in the most recently completed 2019 season, North Dakota, joined the Missouri Valley Football Conference in July 2020. The Fighting Hawks left the Big Sky Conference for the non-football Summit League in July 2018, but agreed to honor existing contracts to play Big Sky members in football, and thus played a full Big Sky football schedule in both 2018 and 2019.

Current FCS independents

Former FCS independents

The following is a complete list of teams which have been Division I-AA/FCS Independents since the formation of Division I-AA in 1978. The "Current Conference" column indicates affiliations for the 2020 college football season. Years listed in this table are football seasons; since football is a fall sport, this means that the final season of independent status, or for membership in a given conference, is the calendar year before a conference change took effect.
Teams in italics are current FBS members; this includes second-year transitional schools that are counted as FBS for scheduling purposes but not bowl game eligibility.