How Many Overtimes Can a Basketball Game Have?

Rule 5, Section IV is the tie-score rule, and it is short. If the score is tied at the end of the fourth period, play resumes in 2:30 without change of baskets for any of the overtime periods required. The words "any of the overtime periods required" are the only description of how many, and no number is given. Under the rules, then, a game can have as many overtimes as it takes to break the tie.

A few rules are written specifically for overtime.

• Baskets. The teams change baskets for the second half, and all overtime periods are considered extensions of the second half. That is why play resumes without a change of baskets.
• Team fouls. In an overtime period the first three common fouls by a team are penalty-free, and further common fouls are penalized with one free throw plus a penalty free throw attempt, as described on the page about PF in basketball.
• The last two minutes. The rules that apply in the last two minutes of the fourth period also apply in the last two minutes of any overtime period, including the stopping of the timing devices after a successful field goal and the away-from-the-play foul.

A player is disqualified from the game on his sixth personal foul, and the rule is stated for the game as a whole, not for a period.

Rule 6, Section I says the game and any overtime are started with a jump ball in the center circle. After that, the rules for a normal period apply, with a few allowances written for overtime. Each team is allowed two team timeouts in overtime periods, compared with seven charged timeouts in regulation play. The two-minute rules, which stop the clock after a successful field goal, apply to the last two minutes of an overtime period as they do to the last two minutes of the fourth.

Nothing in the text covered here limits how many overtime periods can be played.

Because each overtime period is its own short period for fouls, the team-foul count starts again in every overtime. Rule 5 says the first three common fouls a team commits in any overtime period result in the ball being awarded to the opposing team on the sideline nearest where play was interrupted, no nearer to the baseline than the free throw line extended. A team that has not used its quota of three team fouls during the first three minutes of an overtime period may commit one team foul in the last two minutes without penalty. From the fourth common foul on, each foul is penalized with one free throw plus a penalty free throw attempt. Personal fouls that are flagrant, punching, away-from-the-play, clear path-to-the-basket or transition take fouls carry their own penalties and also count in the team foul total.

The timeouts follow the same pattern. Each team is allowed two team timeouts in every overtime period, so a game with three overtimes gives each team two timeouts in each of them.

The rules also say how long a scoring or record-keeping mistake can be corrected. Errors that occur in the fourth period or in an overtime must be discovered and rectified before the end of that period. A record-keeping error by the official scorer about the score, the number of personal fouls, team fouls or timeouts may be corrected by the officials at any time before the end of the fourth period, and an error that occurs in overtime must be corrected before the end of that overtime. In a long game this means each overtime closes its own account.

The wording comes from Rules 3, 5 and 12 of the official 2025-26 NBA playing rules. The statement that the rulebook sets no maximum rests on the text of Rule 5, Section IV, which gives no number. The page does not claim anything about how many overtimes the longest NBA game has had, since that is not in the rulebook.

The rules are reviewed each year. This page was checked against the 2025-26 edition. More basketball pages are collected on the NBA hub, and the page about switching baskets covers the second-half rule.