NHL 26 is getting a major facelift with what’s probably the biggest overhaul to Hockey Ultimate Team (HUT) we’ve seen in a long time. The goal is to make the whole experience more flexible, more structured, and more rewarding for everyone.
There’s a lot that’s different this year, and it can be overwhelming. Luckily, once you put it all together, it’s easy to understand.
What We Know About NHL 26’s HUT Seasons and Live Service
One of the first things you’ll notice is a completely rebuilt main menu. It’s supposed to be way faster, less cluttered, and more intuitive, so you don’t have to click around as much to find what you’re looking for. It’ll also show off your best player cards right on the home screen and even integrates the old lineup screen directly into the Edit Lines function, making it way easier to manage your team and chemistry.
For all the people who wanted a better offline experience, there’s a new mode called Cup Chase. It’s an 18-game season that ends with best-of-three playoff rounds. Every win gets you closer to a trophy, and every loss makes things a bit tougher, it’s a good alternative to Be A Pro Mode.
Competitive play is also getting a big boost with a proper ladder system called Ranked. This new structure uses divisions and, more importantly, “matchmaking floors” that stop you from dropping an entire division once you earn it. This makes the climb feel a lot more encouraging. Every game you play gets you closer to rewards, with clear reward ladders and division tiers.
Team building in NHL 26 is also getting way more strategic, moving past just stacking high-overall cards. They’re adding player Combinations and a Salary Cap system. Combinations give you bonuses when you link up specific player types, nationalities, or team links, which can affect things like Ability Points, Salary Cap space, or even overall ratings, but this is also where ICE 2.0 can help.
Content delivery is also more structured this time around with four core programs: Captains, Heroes, Icons, and Rookies. These programs will anchor each season with curated pools of stars, franchise legends, all-time greats, and breakout talent.
Everything Coming in Ranked
Get ready for some big changes in NHL 26’s Hockey Ultimate Team competitive play. They’re introducing a new ladder system called Ranked, and it’s designed to make everything more consistent, fair, and rewarding for everyone, no matter how much time you have to play. The whole idea behind Ranked is to give you a clear path forward so you always know where you stand and what you need to do to get to the next level.
This is a huge improvement over the old, sometimes confusing, competitive formats, giving you a much more structured way to play online. A big part of this new Ranked system is the new divisions. These are what will clearly show you your skill level and progress, making the whole competitive climb way more transparent.
One awesome feature, designed to stop you from getting super frustrated, is the new “matchmaking floors.” Once you make it to a new division, these floors will prevent you from getting knocked back down to a previous division, even if you have a rough losing streak. This is such a smart move because it means your progress is generally forward-moving.
It shifts the focus from constantly trying to recover lost ground to consistently building on your achievements. The goal is to create a more positive and motivating environment where every step forward feels secure and well-earned.
The new system makes every single game you play in Ranked meaningful. It’s now way easier to track your division tiers with clear visual indicators that show you exactly where you are and how close you are to the next milestone. Plus, there are comprehensive reward ladders that explicitly show you the rewards you’re working towards at each stage of your competitive journey.
This transparency in rewards ensures you always have a tangible goal to chase, which will definitely get you more engaged and motivated to play. For the most serious and skilled players, making it to the Qualification Division is your ticket to HUT Champs. This is where the absolute best players in the HUT community go to face the toughest competition and earn the most exclusive rewards in the entire mode.
At the very top of HUT Champs is the prestigious Ultimate Rank, which gives you a unique, season-specific jersey to show off your top-tier performance for that season. To keep things fresh, the entire Ranked ladder gets a reset at the end of each cycle. This seasonal reset means every new season is a fresh start with new opportunities to climb the ranks, get new rewards, and test your skills against a refreshed pool of competitors.
Everything Coming in Cup Chase
NHL 26 is bringing some serious changes to the offline experience with a brand-new mode called Cup Chase. This new feature is all about giving the community what it’s been asking for: a more engaging and deeper solo experience.
It’s not just a bunch of random games against the CPU; Cup Chase gives you a structured, connected season that makes every single moment matter. You’ll play an 18-game regular season, and how well you do directly impacts your path to the championship trophy. So every win pushes you closer, and every loss raises the stakes, making for a much more immersive solo journey.
Once the regular season is over, the excitement ramps up with a playoff bracket featuring a best-of-three series. This is a true test of your skills and strategy, just like a real-life hockey tournament. One of the best things about Cup Chase is how flexible and player-focused it is. There are no leaderboards to chase or frustrating weekly resets.
You can just play at your own pace, which makes it perfect for both casual players who want a relaxed experience and competitive offline players looking for a real challenge. You can also adjust the difficulty completely, so you can always set the experience to exactly how you want it.
But it’s not just about the gameplay; Cup Chase has its own dedicated reward track, which is separate from the main XP Path. This is a smart move because it means every step of your journey feels meaningful, with specific rewards tied directly to your progress in Cup Chase. You’ll always feel a sense of accomplishment as you make your way through the season and playoffs.
Plus, there’s a clever integration that makes sure your progress in Cup Chase also counts toward your overall XP Path. This means you’re always moving forward in your Hockey Ultimate Team journey, whether you’re playing online or offline. This dual progression system really maximizes the value of the time you spend in Cup Chase, ensuring the offline experience isn’t just rewarding on its own, but also enhances your broader HUT experience.
Everything Coming in Seasonal Programs
NHL 26’s Hockey Ultimate Team is getting a massive overhaul, especially with its live service stuff. They’re totally changing how we get content and build our teams all season long, with Seasonal Programs leading the way.
The entire content structure has been rebuilt from the ground up to be clearer, more consistent, and much more strategic. It’s a huge move away from how things used to be, which often felt a bit random. This year, you can expect four main programs: Captains, Heroes, Icons, and Rookies. This makes sure we’ll have a steady and exciting stream of new player items and events.
These programs aren’t just one-and-done deals, either. They’re designed to roll out with multiple content drops throughout the year, so they’ll stay relevant and fun to chase well after they first launch. This layered approach means we’ll always have something fresh to work toward and add to our teams as the season goes on.
The Captains program will feature a curated selection of fan-favorite stars who will serve as the leaders for each season, giving us strong, recognizable players to build our squads around. Then, the Heroes program will honor players who really defined specific eras for their franchises, letting us relive and add those iconic moments from hockey history to our current lineups. For those of us who love the all-time greats, the Icons program is dedicated to celebrating the legends and Hall of Famers, offering premium items that honor their huge careers.
Finally, the Rookies program will shine a spotlight on both past and present breakout talents. This gives us the chance to grab promising young stars or nostalgic throwbacks who made an immediate impact. These four distinct categories make sure we get a diverse range of player types and historical significance, which is great for all the different ways we like to build our teams.
Another really big improvement in this new structure is how they’ve reworked Alumni items. They’re now their own dedicated card type, which instantly makes them more valuable and easier to integrate into the game from day one.
Everything Coming in Team Building
For NHL 26, they’re completely changing how you build your team in Hockey Ultimate Team. Instead of just stacking your roster with the highest-rated cards, this year it’s all about strategy and being smart about how you build your team. The two biggest new things are player combinations and a dynamic salary cap system.
Player combinations add a super interesting layer of strategy. You can now get major bonuses by linking certain players together. These links can be based on a bunch of different things, like the type of card, their nationality, or if they’ve played on the same team. When you make a successful connection, you get some awesome benefits. This can be things like extra Ability Points, more Salary Cap room, or even a direct boost to a player’s overall rating. This system really pushes you to experiment and build a cohesive team instead of just a bunch of all-stars, which is pretty cool.
On top of that, there’s a new Salary Cap system. This is a huge deal because it forces you to think about every single player you add to your team. You can’t just fill your roster with the most expensive, top-tier players anymore. You’ll have to balance out your star players with some more affordable ones who still fit your strategy and team chemistry. It makes you manage your roster like a real NHL general manager and makes every single decision feel a lot more important.
All of these new team-building changes are tied into the new Seasonal structure in NHL 26. Seasons are now the main way they’ll be releasing new content, cards, and events in HUT. The best part is that your progress and lineup don’t get reset each season. Instead, each new season builds on what you’ve already done, giving you new strategies and ways to evolve your lineup.
