The WNBA, the US women’s basketball major league, has announced the terms of its preliminary collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with the WNBPA labor union, which it expects will see it deliver more than $1 billion in player salaries and benefits over the term.
Beginning with the upcoming 2026 campaign, the new CBA will run through the 2032 season, and has set the new salary cap at $7 million per team, an increase of over 400% on the previous CBA’s limit, set at $1.5 million.
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The league states that the average WNBA salary will rise to over $583,000, with the new minimum salary standing at $300,000, with the maximum salary in 2026 standing at 1.4 million, with the potential to rise to over 2.4 million by the time the CBA has run its course (with the average salary rising to over $1 million in that same time frame).
This is courtesy of the first “comprehensive” revenue-sharing agreement between the WNBA and the WNBPA, enshrined in the CBA, with the salary cap to be adjusted on a season-by-season basis based on the league’s overall revenue growth.
Existing rookie-scale contracts will now be adjusted to a new, higher pay scale.
Inside the CBA also exist provisions to increase the number of regular-season games per team each year, currently 44, which could rise to 50 in 2027, and again to 52 in 2029 with the addition of new expansion franchises.
Speaking on the new agreement, WNBA commissioner Cathy Englebert stated: “This CBA represents a defining moment in the WNBA’s 30-year history and all of women’s professional sports.
“Since its inception, the WNBA has been shaped by extraordinary athletes who believed in the league’s future. The agreement is a testament to that belief and to the tremendous progress we have achieved together.”
The CBA still needs to be approved by WNBA players and the league’s board of governors, both formalities that will precede the start of what is set to be a transformational change to the amount of money players can earn.
An agreement was reached in the early hours of Wednesday morning, following over a week of crunch day and night negotiations seeking to avert what could have been a disastrous lockout.
In all, over 100 hours of negotiations were required to ameliorate the divide between the two parties on prominent issues such as the salary system and revenue sharing.
Terri Carmichael Jackson, the executive director of the WNBPA, added of the protracted negotiations: “This agreement delivers what players set out to do from the beginning, transforming the economics of this league. It marks a new era led by players who know their power and choose to use it.”
The last CBA expired after the 2025 campaign, with the WNBA opting out of the final year of that agreement (which would have covered 2026) back in October 2024 in favor of entering a new negotiation period.
Negotiations have been ongoing since the opt-out, but there was significant trouble in reaching a deal, with both sides at times accusing the other of refusing to engage with the process.
The 2026 WNBA campaign will begin on May 8, and should avoid disruption in the fallout, despite the WNBA previously stating that a March 10 deadline was required to avoid any delay in the season tip-off.
A lockout, effectively a delay or outright cancellation of the WNBA campaign, would have significantly halted the WNBA’s strong momentum, which has seen continued broadcast viewership growth and the addition of multiple expansion franchises.
