Regular season Play-in tournament led the
Portland Trail Blazers to the first play-in tournament victory in NBA history.|390x390px During the 2020 NBA Bubble, the NBA introduced a play-in tournament in the
2019–20 NBA season to compensate for the suspension of the regular season and a difference in the number of games played between teams, as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic. For the 2019–20 NBA season, if a conference's 9th-place team was within 4
games back of the 8th-place team in the standings, a play-in matchup between the two seeds would be triggered. To clinch the 8th seed in the playoffs, the 8th-place team would need to win one game, while the 9th-place team would need to win two in the matchup. Due to the success of the NBA play-in tournament and the COVID-19 pandemic persisting into the
2020–21 NBA season, the league installed a NBA play-in tournament involving both conference's 7th-place through 10th-place teams in the standings upon the end of the regular season, without regard to games back. The format of the NBA play-in tournament, still in place as of the
2026 season, involves the 7th-place team plays a home game against the 8th-place team, with the winner clinching the 7th seed in their respective conference's playoff bracket. Meanwhile, the 9th-place team plays a home game against the 10th-place team, with the loser being eliminated from playoffs contention. Then, the winner of the 9th-10th place team plays on the road, visiting the loser of the 7th-8th place matchup. The winner of this game clinches the 8th seed, with the loser being eliminated. 24 teams of the NBA's 30 teams have played at least one play-in game; the 6 teams yet to participate are the
Utah Jazz,
Milwaukee Bucks,
Houston Rockets,
Denver Nuggets,
New York Knicks and
Detroit Pistons.
Playoffs ==Defunct franchises==