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Aaron Rodgers to retire after 2026 season

Brian Jones Profile Picby: Brian Jones05/20/26brianjones_93

Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers told reporters on Wednesday that he will retire after the 2026 season. Rodgers said, “This is it,” when he was asked if this is his final year.

The announcement came shortly after Aaron Rodgers signed a one-year contract with the Steelers. When Mike Tomlin stepped down as head coach of the Steelers at the end of the 2025 season, Rodgers said he thought he was done in Pittsburgh.

“I thought that was probably it for me in Pittsburgh,” Rodgers said. “But when the decision was made to hire Mike (McCarthy), I started opening my mind back up to coming back.”

Rodgers joined the Steelers last year after spending the last three seasons with the New York Jets. In 2025, the four-time NFL MVP led Pittsburgh to a division title while throwing for 3,322 yards and 24 touchdowns.

Aaron Rodgers will play his final season with Mike McCarthy

“He’s extremely focused and locked in,” Steelers quarterbacks coach Tom Arth said, per Teresa Varley of Steelers.com. “He’s such a competitive player, but he has so much fun playing the game. And that’s what I really enjoy about Aaron.

“He loves playing this game. He plays the game like he’s still 10 years old running around in the backyard.
“At the same time, he’s got this ferocious competitive spirit that obviously helped push him to the heights that he’s reached.”

No matter what happens with Rodgers in 2026, he has put together a Hall of Fame career. He spent the majority of his 21 seasons with the Green Bay Packers and has thrown for 66,274 yards and 527 touchdowns. He has been selected to the Pro Bowl 10 times, named to the All-Pro Team five times, and led the Packers to a Super Bowl win in 2011 (for the 2010 season).

With Rodgers back with the Steelers, he is reunited with McCarthy, who was the head coach of the Packers from 2006 to 2018. “There was a lot of conversation that went on, particularly the last five or six weeks,” McCarthy said about Rodgers. “But being here for OTAs, in my view, is what I was looking for and what he was looking for. And we’ll get the work done that we need to get done.”