Bundesliga 2026-27 relegation and European qualification rules explained: the safety line is 92 points

Union Berlin can win all 30 of their remaining matches, finish on 91 points, and our table will still print nothing in their safety column. That is not missing data. A club is clear of relegation only once at least two other clubs can no longer reach its total, and the two lowest totals Union have to clear belong to Mönchengladbach, who top out at 90, and to Hoffenheim, Stuttgart and Hamburg, who all top out at 93. That puts Union's safety line at 94, three more than a perfect run can produce. For the 16 clubs that do carry a number, the same rule puts the line at 92. Their row is the shortest lesson in how these six numbers are built.

Every figure here comes from the September 21 update of our Bundesliga table. Thirty-six of the season's 306 matches are in, the last of them Paderborn's 3-1 win over Hoffenheim and the goalless draw between Schalke and Elversberg. All 18 clubs have now played four matches and have 30 left, so the points column compares like with like.

The competition is simple to state. Eighteen clubs play each other home and away, 34 matches each, three points for a win and one for a draw. Our table ranks the 18 on points and draws two lines across it: the top four take the European qualifying places, the bottom two go down. Clubs level on points are printed in goal difference order, then goals scored, and that order is the only thing those two figures decide here. Bayern Munich have scored 14 and conceded 2, Freiburg 12 and 3, both sit on 10 points, and their six numbers are identical: 88 and 82 in the guarantee columns, 30 in the title elimination column, blanks in the other three. Bayern are printed second on plus 12 against Freiburg's plus 9, and nothing in the arithmetic separates them. The same holds lower down, where Augsburg, Leverkusen, Mainz, Elversberg and Werder Bremen all sit on 7 points with five different goal records. Augsburg and Leverkusen are level even on goal difference at plus 5, split on the page only by goals scored, 11 against 10, and all five carry one identical set of numbers.

Two lines across 18 clubs leave three questions for every club. Will it finish first, will it finish in the top four, will it stay out of the bottom two. Each question is asked in both directions, guarantee and elimination, and those six answers are the six numbers on every row. The three guarantee numbers are counted in points still to be collected. Add a club's current points to its top-four clinch number and the answer is 98 every time: Dortmund on 12 need 86 more, Bayern and Freiburg on 10 need 88. Those three are the only clubs with a figure in that column, because the other 15 cannot reach 98 at all. The five clubs on 7 points top out at 97, Leipzig at 96, Frankfurt and Schalke at 95. The title line is 101 and only Dortmund carry a number under it, 89 more points from 30 matches, and since the only total at or above 89 that 30 matches can produce is 90, that line means winning every match left. The safety line is 92, and 16 clubs carry a number for it, from Dortmund's 80 to Paderborn's 88 to Hoffenheim's 89. Each of those totals is the worst case written out in full, the figure that holds under every combination of results still open to a club's rivals.

The three elimination numbers are counted in defeats, not points. Two clubs carry a figure in all three. Mönchengladbach sit at 28 for the top four, 27 for the title and 30 for relegation; Union Berlin at 29, 27 and 30. Those two 30s are the only relegation numbers printed anywhere on the table, and each one is every match that club has left, so only losing the lot makes the drop certain by a club's own results. Five clubs sit at 30 in the top-four column, Leipzig, Frankfurt, Schalke, Paderborn and Köln, with Hoffenheim, Stuttgart, Hamburg and Union Berlin one step behind at 29. Bayern and Freiburg have a title elimination number of 30, again every match they have left. Dortmund have no number in any of the three elimination columns at all.

The two directions do not treat a tie the same way, and that is by design. A clinch number counts any rival who can still draw exactly level with you as a threat, so the line has to clear them outright. That is why safety sits at 92 rather than 91 for the clubs that can reach it: Mönchengladbach can still reach 90 and Union Berlin 91, and a club level on points is scored against the club being asked about. An elimination number runs the other way and counts only rivals who can finish strictly above you, because drawing level with you cannot by itself put you out. Both rules come from one principle, that a tie goes against the club in question. The practical consequence is that our clinch can trail an official announcement by a day. What the arithmetic does not use: goal difference, who plays whom, and the official tiebreak rules. It uses points and matches left, and nothing else.

A blank is not a zero, and it does not mean one thing. In a guarantee column it means out of reach: Augsburg would need 91 more points from a maximum of 90, so no run of their own results settles a top-four place, and the title column is blank for 17 clubs for the same reason. In an elimination column it means the reverse, that the question cannot be closed by losing. Dortmund, Bayern, Freiburg and the five clubs on 7 points could lose every remaining match and our arithmetic would still not call a top-four finish impossible for them. And a blank never means already decided, because decided would be a zero, and there is not a zero in any of those six columns. Dortmund's three blanks all sit in elimination columns and Union Berlin's three all sit in guarantee columns, which is the same mark carrying opposite news. The rank range columns close the point: all 18 clubs can still finish first and all 18 can still finish 18th.

The table now sits still until October 10. That Saturday, Augsburg host Bayern, Dortmund host Werder Bremen, Mainz host Leverkusen, Paderborn host Stuttgart, Union Berlin host Elversberg and Hoffenheim host Hamburg. Sunday October 11 brings Köln against Mönchengladbach and Leipzig against Frankfurt. Two of those matter for the lines in this article. Augsburg against Bayern puts a club whose ceiling of 97 is one point short of the top-four line against one of the three clubs still on that line. Köln against Mönchengladbach is the first chance for the only club still on zero points to change the 0 in the points column, and the safety column shrinks from two directions: points a club collects itself, and points Mönchengladbach and Union Berlin fail to collect, because it is their ceilings of 90 and 91 that put the line at 92 in the first place.

How to read these numbers. A clinch number is the minimum a club must still collect for the outcome to hold no matter how its rivals' remaining results fall. A tragic number is the count of further defeats after which the outcome is impossible even if that club wins everything else. A rank range is the highest and lowest final position still arithmetically reachable. Ties are scored against the club being asked about, so our clinch can trail an official announcement by a day, and a tie on its own never eliminates anyone. The live table is at, the remaining fixtures at, the qualification and relegation rules at, the clinch and tragic numbers at and the method itself at. Each club's own six numbers sit on its page, such as. To enter results yourself and watch the lines move, use.