Rules & Scoring

Overview Draft Styles

Salary Cap

In salary cap contests, participants will create a lineup by selecting players listed in the Player Pool. Each player listed has an assigned salary and a valid lineup must not exceed the salary cap.

Tiers

In Tiers contests, participants will create a lineup by selecting players listed in the Player Pool. Each player listed has an assigned Tier, and a valid lineup must include a player from each Tier. The number of Tiers may vary based on the Game Set.

Lineup Edits

Late Swap

For late-swap contests, lineups may be edited at any time leading up to games. Each individual player will become "locked" at the scheduled start time of their team’s game. A locked player cannot be added or removed from a roster spot. Locked roster spots for all entries are displayed in contest GameCenters.

In the rare case that a game starts before the scheduled start time, all players within that game will become locked as soon as our feed reflects that the game has begun. Additionally, any swaps that were made after the real-life start time of the game will result in those lineups being disqualified and refunded.

Non-Late Swap

For non-late swap contests, lineups may be edited at any time leading up to the start of a contest. Each player will become "locked" at the scheduled start time of the contest. A locked player cannot be added or removed from a roster spot.

In the rare case that a game starts before the scheduled contest start time, all players within that game will become locked as soon as our feed reflects that the game has begun. Additionally, any lineup swaps including players from the game that were made after the real-life start time of the game will result in those lineups being disqualified and refunded.

For both late swap and non-late swap contests, players on opponent lineups will remain hidden until the players’ respective game start times.

Position Eligibility

Player positions are determined at the sole discretion of DraftKings.

Traded Player Policy

For all DraftKings’ team sports, when a player is traded (changes teams) after contests for a given Game Set have become available but before contests start, traded players will be eligible to accrue fantasy points for their new team when BOTH teams (the player’s old and new teams) are in the Game Set. Any lineup entries that break roster requirement rules because of a trade will be cancelled and refunded. Where possible, DraftKings will notify these users via email and/or other notification features on site.

When there is a trade (a changing of teams) involving a player in which the team the player has been traded to (their new team) is NOT in a Game Set, the player will remain on his original team (the old team) and will be ineligible to accrue fantasy points.

Where a player is traded to a team in a Game Set which their old team was not a part of, the player will NOT be added to the player pool.

Where possible, DraftKings will add warnings to Draft Screens once it is known that a player has been traded and therefore eligible or ineligible to register points based on the positioning of their new and old teams in various Game Sets. Where possible, users that have traded players that are ineligible to accrue fantasy points in their lineup(s) may be notified via email and/or other notification features on the site.

Contest Entry

The Entry-Fee and Prize Pool for a contest will not change once the contest is created. Therefore, each contest has a maximum amount of total entries accepted. Contests that have not reached capacity will be available for entry up until the contest start time.

Guaranteed contests will run (with prizes unchanged) even if they do not reach capacity before the contest start time. Non-guaranteed contests that do not reach capacity by contest start time may be merged with other similar unfilled contests or may be canceled and refunded.

Scoring and Payouts

Live scoring updates are strictly for the enjoyment of DraftKings customers. DraftKings’ official scoring validation process begins once all games within the contest are final. This process ensures that DraftKings scoring matches official stat providers when contest results are finalized and paid out.

Once contests are finalized, a contest status will update to "Completed", and that contest will move from the "Live Games" section to the "Completed Games" section on the My Contests page.

DraftKings uses statistics from third party providers for the purposes of providing game results and real-time entertainment value to its end users. These third party providers include, but are not limited to, Stats Perform, Sportradar, FightMetric, GameScorekeeper, Champion Data, and in some cases, data provided directly by applicable sports leagues. DraftKings may change third party providers from time to time without notice. For more information, please contact DraftKings customer service at support@draftkings.com.

On occasion, official scorers may issue a stat-correction after games have ended and the official scoring validation process has completed. These corrections are rare, but can occur days after a game is played. Therefore, any changes to official scoring that occur after contests have been finalized will not impact those finalized contests. Conversely, if a correction needs to be made after contests are finalized due to a bug with the data feed or the finalization process, while extremely rare, the finalization process (including payment) may be reversed and redone correctly.

Note: The official scoring validation process is solely to ensure that DraftKings contest results are determined based on official scoring. Delays during this process may occur as a result of data collection or other technical difficulties. DraftKings will not attempt to make judgements on scoring rulings.

In the event that two or more players are tied for a cash or cash-equivalent prize, the prize is split among the tied users. For non-cash prizes, the tiebreaking methodology is as follows:

• If the prize includes a ticket, the cash value of the ticket will be split among the tied users.
• If the prize involves a qualifier ticket to a specific contest, DraftKings will create a tiebreaker contest for the tied users to compete in. The winner(s) of the tiebreaking contest will receive the ticket.
• If the prize is a ticket to advance to the next round of a Best Ball tournament, the tiebreaker will be which user has the highest scoring week in the round. If multiple users remain tied after the highest scoring week, the next tiebreaker will be the second highest scoring week in the round, and so on until an advancing lineup is identified.
• Note: specialty contests or contests with sponsor prizes may have different tie breaking rules. Please see the contest’s rules & scoring page or the terms of service for a specific promotion to learn more about how tie breaking scenarios are handled.

Player Salaries

DraftKings' player salaries are intended to provide an interesting, challenging, skill-based game resulting in a top quality experience for DraftKings customers. Player salaries are determined based on historical statistics and aspects of a player’s upcoming matchup may be factored into their salary.

Please note that player salaries listed are a function of the salary cap fantasy sports contest format and are not intended, and should not be relied upon, as any indication of real-life salary valuations of the individual players.