Northwestern University is building a new Ryan Field, set to open in 2026, with a focus on an enhanced fan experience.
The new stadium will cost $862 million, largely funded by the Ryan family, and will have a reduced capacity of 35,000.
The stadium will include a canopy covering 100% of the seats to protect fans from weather and amplify crowd noise.
EVANSTON, IL – Pat Ryan Jr. has a vision for Northwestern football fans when the school completes its construction of Ryan Field, and the Wildcats can begin playing games in a permanent home starting in the 2026 season.
Ryan, an alum and President and CEO of Ryan Sports Development, whose family ties to Northwestern span generations ― and whose father’s name the brand-new stadium will bear ― has sought to improve the fan experience for college football games by eliminating the worst seat in the stadium.
‘The death of the nosebleeds, ‘the most expensive seat to build, the hardest seat to sell and has the lowest satisfaction,’ Ryan told USA TODAY Sports.
Northwestern is looking to the future when it comes to the fan experience, and the elimination of the nosebleeds is just the beginning.
‘So that is unique, a premium experience for everybody involved,’ Northwestern athletic director Mark Jackson told USA TODAY Sports. ‘Not only is it the most accessible stadium for those dealing with physical disabilities, but we also wanted to make it accessible from a price standpoint, too, and to make it affordable so that our young alums can take part in this or younger people that are just starting their careers, to come in, have a premium experience, have a chair back on every seat, have a covered canopy that protects everybody from the elements.
‘Those kinds of opportunities that, comprehensively throughout an entire stadium, we haven’t seen quite like this.’
The Wildcats played the first five home games of this season at Martin Stadium — a re-imagined lacrosse field — and will play the final two home games of the season at Wrigley Field (a 24-22 loss to Michigan on Nov. 15 and again on Nov. 22 vs. Minnesota).
Last season, the Wildcats played two games at Wrigley Field against Ohio State and Illinois. Here’s what you need to know about the new Ryan Field, which is estimated to be the largest college football stadium project in history:
How much did Northwestern’s new stadium cost?
When renderings for Ryan Field were first unveiled on Nov. 18, 2024, the price tag for its construction was listed at $850 million. Ryan said the final approved budget for the new Ryan Field comes in at $862 million, a number Ryan says would have ballooned by nearly 50% had the university waited.
‘I’ve been told by more than one person that if we bid it out now, it probably costs $1.2 billion,’ Ryan said.
Who is paying for Northwestern’s Ryan Field?
The majority of the cost to complete Ryan Field comes from the Ryan family itself. However, the university is also chipping in for the cost, which it had already raised through donors to initially renovate the stadium.
Starting over with a new stadium made more sense for Ryan and Northwestern than renovation. The old Ryan Field was originally opened on Oct. 2, 1926 and expanded in 1949 and 1952 before undergoing renovations in 1996. Northwestern’s former home was demolished in 2024.
‘The reason we didn’t renovate the old stadium is because we would have spent all that money, and frankly, all it would have done is shore up the old building structurally,’ Ryan said.
‘The building did not have a lot that was preservable at the time. It’s 100 years old next year. … We did not want to spend $300 million on propping up a building that did not improve anything. It didn’t make sense. So, the university had a commitment to how much money it was going to put into renovating the stadium. We said we would finance the balance of that.’
The Ryan family company ― Ryan Sports Development ― is in charge of the design and development of the new Ryan Field. The Ryan family is a minority owner of the Chicago Bears and owns a stake in the English Premier League club AFC Bournemouth.
‘I want to be really clear on this is that it’s just not your typical donation. This is an investment, not only of resources from the Ryan families at an incredibly generous amount, but it’s they’re also intimately involved in the design and development and management of the project,’ Jackson said.
When will the Northwestern’s new Ryan Field open?
Ryan told USA TODAY Sports that Ryan Field is on target to open in the fall of 2026. When Northwestern will play its first game, however, is to be determined.
The Wildcats have three games already scheduled for 2026, two of which are good options early in the season: on Saturday, Sept. 12 vs. South Dakota State and Saturday, Sept. 19 vs. Colorado.
Ryan Field capacity
New Ryan Field capacity: 35,000
Old Ryan Field capacity: 47,130
One thing fans will notice about the new Ryan Field will be a reduced capacity. The 35,000-seat venue will easily be the smallest in the Big Ten Conference. The former Ryan Field’s capacity was 47,130 — already the smallest in the conference, behind Minnesota’s Huntington Bank Stadium capacity of 50,805.
‘We didn’t just reduce the number of seats. We actually reduced the numbers,’ Ryan said. ‘We did that so that we could put every seat on top of the action by not having to put another 20,000 seats behind. It meant that you don’t have to worry about blocking those other seats. So you can put everybody in. So when you come through the stadium, we’ll get to give you a point.’
The removal of the nosebleeds is part of the reason for the reduction in the number of seats. But it sets up an opportunity for the new Ryan Field to give a different experience to fans.
Better sightlines are a major selling point of the brand-new stadium.
‘When you go through the stadium, you will see that the sightlines in our stadium, the worst seat in the house, are 136 feet from the sideline,’ Ryan said. ‘The most expensive seat at Notre Dame is 235 feet away. So, what we’ve done is we put people right on top of the action in a way that feels like it’s better than TV because you’re so close.
‘It’s like you’re watching on TV, but you can see everything at the same time. So it’s better than the sightlines. This death of the nosebleed is the first thing.’
Canopy covers most of Ryan Field
Ryan Field will take a decidedly NFL approach when it comes to canopy coverage.
In the NFL, the Buffalo Bills have a canopy that covers 64% of the stands at Highmark Stadium, getting the majority of the fans away from the harsh conditions in Buffalo during the winter. The Miami Dolphins’ Hard Rock Stadium offers 92% canopy coverage to protect fans from the harsh South Florida heat.
In Illinois, the average high temperatures are 49 and 36 degrees, respectively, in November and December. The threat of cold rain or snow is always prevalent in those months near Lake Michigan. That’s why at the new Ryan Field, 100% of the fans will be covered by a canopy.
‘Most people look at it and say, well, that’s a soccer thing? Do you think that the reason there’s a roof canopy over the seats is because of the shape of the ball? Of course not,’ Ryan said.
‘It’s because soccer is played in the UK, which is played in England in January, where it’s cold and rainy. In Chicago in November, it gets cold and rainy. So the idea of leaving, we try to take the best of both, leave the game out in the elements, but protect the fans from adverse weather, creates more of that experience.’
Ryan added that creating 100% coverage eliminates the distinction of ‘haves and have-nots.’
‘We’re a college, we’re a university, it’s everybody, we should, we’re a community,’ Ryan said. ‘The community should all be having experience together, not that there are people in the skyboxes and the people on the benches. It should be the same for everybody. So this premium for everybody; nobody’s done that in football before.’
Another unique aspect that canopy will bring is amplifying crowd noise, despite the smaller capacity, giving Northwestern a different home-field advantage at games.
‘The canopy just doesn’t protect you from the weather, but it also reverberates sound,’ Ryan said. ‘It will allow our might Wildcat Nation to be loud and intimidating in a way that’s hard in a big open-air stadium, because the noise dissipates out.’
Fan experience outside of Ryan Field
For Ryan, the experience of a college football Saturday does not start and end with the football game. For a fan who has to travel to watch a Northwestern game, the experience should start from the time the fans arrive at the stadium and end when they exit.
That’s why part of the construction of the stadium also includes a Wildcat Plaza ― four festival grounds wrapping around the stadium ― for fans to tailgate and get the entire experience of a college football game.
‘We’ve created like the Super Bowl, we created like a campus around it,’ Ryan said. ‘So you enter, you don’t enter the building with your ticket. You enter the festival grounds that surround the building, and then you have a choice. You can go to any of these festivals. Students have the student one, but you can go to a festival where you can tailgate yourself or you can go to a community tailgate.
‘You can go to some of the best pop-up restaurants in town, like a street festival type of feel, or you can take kids and go to something where it’s like the, where you can like do all the cool drills like you’re at the NFL experience at the Super Bowl.’