The NFL Teams That Have Lost the Most Super Bowls

Green Bay is known as Titletown thanks to the Packers’ 13 NFL championships — nine titles in the pre-Super Bowl era and four Super Bowls, including the first two. The Packers have only lost one Super Bowl, in 1998. Brett Favre and the Packers were aiming to win back-to-back Super Bowls but were thwarted by the Denver Broncos and Super Bowl MVP Terrell Davis.

Like the Green Bay Packers, the New York Giants have only lost one Super Bowl out of their five appearances. In 2001, the Giants were shooting for their third Super Bowl title but ran into the legendary 2000 Ravens defense, which featured such Hall of Famers as Rod Woodson and Ray Lewis. The Giants turned the ball over five times as the Ravens cruised to a 34-7 win.

The Kansas City Chiefs’ lone Super Bowl loss came in 1967, in the first Super Bowl. At that point, the game had not yet taken on the title of “Super Bowl” and was still referred to as the “AFL-NFL Championship Game.”

Len Dawson and the Chiefs were dominated by Bart Starr and the Green Bay Packers and defeated 35-10 in Super Bowl I. Kansas City went on to win Super Bowl IV in 1970, but then fans had to wait more than 50 years for another appearance in the big game — when Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs to their second Super Bowl win in 2020.

One of the most dominant franchises in the early days of the NFL, the Chicago Bears have only made it to two Super Bowls, winning once. After the legendary 1985 Bears won Super Bowl XX, Chicago fans had to wait over three decades for another Super Bowl berth.

The Bears’ lone Super Bowl loss came in 2007, when Peyton Manning was finally able to win his first championship, guiding the Indianapolis Colts to a 29-17 win over the Bears.

The Arizona Cardinals franchise is one of three NFL teams to lose their only Super Bowl appearance. The 2008 Cardinals team were surprise NFC champions, winning a weak NFC West division with a 9-7 record.

In Super Bowl XLIII, the Cardinals were down 13 in the second half to the Pittsburgh Steelers but staged a huge comeback to take the lead with less than three minutes remaining. Yet Arizona lost in heartbreaking fashion, as Steelers receiver Santonio Holmes made a spectacular touchdown catch in the final minute to give Pittsburgh a 27-23 win.

The only time the Chargers franchise made it to the Super Bowl, they were still playing in San Diego. Those Chargers proved to be no match for Steve Young and the San Francisco 49ers. In Super Bowl XXIX, Young threw for 325 yards and six touchdowns, while the Chargers turned the ball over three times en route to a 49-26 drubbing.

It seemed like the Titans of the 1999-2000 season had fate on their side, winning their first playoff game that season thanks to a wild, last second kickoff return touchdown that became known as the “Music City Miracle.”

But that season, the only one in which the Titans made it to the Super Bowl, ended in heartbreak. Against the St. Louis Rams in Super Bowl XXXIV, Tennessee receiver Kevin Dyson was tackled a yard short of what would have been a game-tying touchdown on the last play of the game. The Titans lost 23-16.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are tied for the most Super Bowl wins, with six. Four came during the Terry Bradshaw era beginning in the 1970s, and two in the 2000s with Ben Roethlisberger at QB. Yet two of PIttsburgh’s Super Bowl appearances ended in losses.

The Steelers lost Super Bowl XXX in 1996, running into a Dallas Cowboys dynasty. And most recently, the Steelers played in the Super Bowl in 2011, losing to Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers.

The San Francisco 49ers won the first five of their seven Super Bowl appearances but lost the most recent two. The team won five titles from 1982 to 1995 with Hall of Famer Joe Montana leading the team to first four titles, and Steve Young winning Super Bowl MVP for the fifth title.

The team struggled in the 2000s after Young retired, but got back to the Super Bowl in 2013. That year, San Francisco lost a close Super Bowl to the Baltimore Ravens 34-31. The 49ers’ dynamic rushing attack brought them to Super Bowl LIV in 2020 against the Kansas City Chiefs. San Francisco has a 10 point lead in the fourth quarter, but Patrick Mahomes led Kansas City on a torrid comeback, and the 49ers would go on to lose 31-20.

The Raiders franchise earned its way into four of the first 18 Super Bowls. Then in Oakland, the Raiders lost Super Bowl II to the Green Bay Packers in 1968. The Raiders were dominant in the late 1970s and early 1980s, winning Super Bowls XI, XV, and XVIII by more than two touchdowns apiece.

After nearly 20 years without a Super Bowl berth, the Raiders made it into Super Bowl XXXVII in 2003 but lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in a lopsided affair, 48-21.

Washington’s first Super Bowl trip was historic, but only because they lost to the undefeated 1972 Miami Dolphins, who are still the only team to put together a perfect season in the Super Bowl era. The franchise’s four other Super Bowl appearances came during Joe Gibbs’ first stint as head coach of the team, from 1981 to 1992.

Washington won their first Super Bowl in 1983, getting revenge on Miami in Super Bowl XVII. The team would fail in their bid to become back-to-back champions the next season, losing 38-9 to running back Marcus Allen and the Los Angeles Raiders. That would be the last Super Bowl Washington would lose, as the team won their next two appearances in convincing fashion, beating the Denver Broncos 42-10 in 1988 and the Buffalo Bills 37-24 in 1992.

In both of its homes, Baltimore and Indianapolis, the Colts franchise won and lost one Super Bowl. The Baltimore Colts were heavily favored in Super Bowl III but could only muster a single touchdown in a 16-7 loss to the New York Jets. The Colts won their first Super Bowl two years later.

The franchise moved to Indianapolis after the 1983 season and struggled to make the postseason before drafting Peyton Manning first overall in the 1998 NFL Draft. The Indianapolis Colts made their first Super Bowl in 2007, defeating the Chicago Bears. Indianapolis made it back to the big game three years later but lost to the New Orleans Saints in that team’s only Super Bowl appearance to date.

Eagles fans had to wait until 2018 for their first Lombardi Trophy. Before that, their first two Super Bowl appearances ended in defeat. In 1981, Philadelphia lost in Super Bowl XV 27-10 to the L.A. Raiders, as QB Ron Jaworski turned the ball over four times and threw for just one touchdown.

More than two decades later, Philly finally made it back to the big game but again came up just short, this time against the New England Patriots.

The Seattle Seahawks had their first NFL season in 1976. It took them 30 years to reach their first Super Bowl. In Super Bowl XL, Seattle’s offense floundered and the team lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers 21-20.

The Seahawks won their first and only championship in 2014, throttling the Denver Broncos 43-8. Seattle nearly repeated as champions the following year, but QB Russell Wilson threw a goal-line interception with less than 30 seconds remaining in the game, sealing Super Bowl XLIX for the New England Patriots.

The Atlanta Falcons are one of five NFL teams with multiple Super Bowl appearances and no trophies to show for it. Atlanta made it to their first Super Bowl in 1999, after upsetting the vaunted 1998 Minnesota Vikings in the NFC Championship game. They would go on to lose to John Elway and the Denver Broncos in the Super Bowl 34-19. In 2017, Atlanta Falcons suffered one of the most shocking collapses in sports history, blowing a 28-3 second half lead to the New England Patriots, falling 34-28 in the only overtime Super Bowl in NFL history.

The Carolina Panthers are one of the newest franchises in the NFL, playing their first season in 1995. In their ninth season, the Panthers made the Super Bowl, facing off against the New England Patriots. The Panthers tied the game with just over a minute to go, but Tom Brady drove the Pats down the field for a game winning field goal with one second on the clock.

In their second Super Bowl appearance, Panthers QB Cam Newton was under constant pressure from the Denver Broncos defense, getting sacked seven times, fumbling twice, and throwing an interception, as Carolina lost 24-10.

The Cincinnati Bengals had the misfortune of having their best years coincide with the San Francisco 49ers dynasty of the 1980s. The Bengals made their first title game appearance in Super Bowl XVI in 1982.

San Francisco jumped out to a 20-0 halftime lead on Cincinnati, and the Bengals comeback bid came up short, as they lost 26-21. In Super Bowl XXIII, it was the Bengals with the late lead, up 13-6 at the end of the third quarter. But Joe Montana tossed two late touchdowns to beat the Bengals 20-16.

The Dallas Cowboys franchise has had two dynasties that produced eight Super Bowl appearances and five championships. The first, led by legendary coach Tom Landry and Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach, reached the Super Bowl six times in the 1970s.

Dallas lost Super Bowls in 1971, 1976, 1979, but won two in 1972 and 1978. The second Dallas dynasty was led by The Triplets — the offensive trio of QB Troy Aikman, running back Emmett Smith, and receiver Michael Irvin. That team won three Super Bowls in four seasons.

From 1972 to 1985, head coach Don Shula led the Miami Dolphins to five Super Bowls, winning two. The team has yet to make it back for their sixth appearance over 35 years later. The Dolphins lost their first Super Bowl by a huge margin to the Dallas Cowboys in 1972.

The next season, Miami became the first and only NFL team to go undefeated in the regular season and win the Super Bowl, then won a second consecutive title the year after. After drafting QB Dan Marino in 1983, Miami made it to two Super Bowls in three seasons, losing both times.

During their time in Los Angeles, the Rams have never won a Super Bowl, but lost two. In their first Super Bowl appearance, the Rams lost Super Bowl XIV in 1980 to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

The franchise moved to St. Louis after the 1994 season, where they won Super Bowl XXXIV in 2000, but they lost the title game two years later to Tom Brady and the New England Patriots, who won their first. The Rams moved back to L.A. after the 2015 season, making the Super Bowl in 2018, again losing to Brady and the Pats.

The Buffalo Bills of the early 1990s remain one of the most improbable stories in sports history — making it to four straight Super Bowls, and losing all four. The team had Hall of Famers like head coach Marv Levy, QB Jim Kelly, and defensive end Bruce Smith, but could never manage to win the big game.

The closest they came was their first Super Bowl berth in 1991, when kicker Scott Norwood missed a 47 yard field goal with seconds remaining, giving the New York Giants a 20-19 win. The next season, they were blown out in the big game by Washington, and they lost the next two to the Dallas Cowboys in similarly lopsided fashion.

In the 1970s, the Minnesota Vikings lost four Super Bowls in an eight year span, and they haven’t been able to get back to the big game since.

Hall of Fame coach Bud Grant turned Minnesota from a losing team to a perennial powerhouse, making the playoffs in a dozen of his 18 seasons from 1967 to 1985, and making it to the big game four times. But those Vikings could never get over the hump — the franchise suffered double digit defeats in Super Bowls IV, VIII, IX, and XI.

Before coach Bill Belichick and QB Tom Brady teamed up to win six rings, the New England Patriots had never won a Super Bowl. The team had lost in two title games previously — to the vaunted 1985 Bears and Brett Favre’s Green Bay Packers in 1997. Since then, the New England Patriots have appeared in nine Super Bowls.

The Pats won three titles from 2002 to 2005 but lost their bid at a perfect season in 2008 when the underdog Giants toppled them 17-14. New York would again spoil the Patriots’ party in 2012 with stout defensive play, beating New England 21-17 in Super Bowl XLVI. Most recently, New England lost Super Bowl LII to Nick Foles and the Philadelphia Eagles in one of the wildest and most memorable shootouts in NFL history.

No team has lost more Super Bowls than the Denver Broncos. The team is tied with the New England Patriots with five Super Bowl defeats, but it has half the Lombardi Trophies, with three. In Denver’s first Super Bowl appearance, they were outclassed by Tom Landry’s Dallas Cowboys in 1978’s Super Bowl XII, losing 27-10.

The Broncos became regular playoff fixtures after acquiring QB John Elway but couldn’t get over the hump, losing three Super Bowls in 1987, 1988, and 1990. Elway and Denver would eventually win back-to-back titles in 1997 and 1998.

Denver’s next Super Bowl appearance came in 2014, with Peyton Manning at QB. That team was completely overwhelmed by the Seattle Seahawks defense, turning the ball over four times and losing 43-8. The team won their third Super Bowl two seasons later, as the Denver defense held the Carolina Panthers to just 10 points in a 24-10 win.