The Green Bay Packers will open Week 12 against the Los Angeles Rams on Thanksgiving Eve, Nov. 25, 2026, in the NFL’s first Thanksgiving Eve game. The league’s full 2026 schedule will be released Thursday at 8 p.m. ET, with the Week 12 slate also featuring the annual Thanksgiving tripleheader and the Black Friday game.
The matchup gives the Rams a marquee holiday-stage slot after a 12-5 season that ended in the NFC Championship Game, and it puts the Packers back in the spotlight after they reached the playoffs for a third straight season in 2025. Green Bay’s late-season fade was hard to ignore: the Packers lost five straight games to finish the year, then came up short in the postseason again.
The game also arrives with both rosters carrying big-name attraction. Matthew Stafford is coming off a season in which he threw for an NFL- and career-high 46 touchdowns and led the league with 4,707 passing yards. The Rams also list Davante Adams, Puka Nacua, Kyren Williams and Jared Verse among their talented players, while the Packers can point to Micah Parsons as a headline name as he returns from a season-ending ACL tear. Green Bay may also have Tucker Kraft back in time for Week 12, and Matthew Golden, a 2025 first-rounder, gives the offense another target worth watching.
The setting makes the league’s new holiday addition feel less like a gimmick and more like a test case. By putting the Packers and Rams in the inaugural Thanksgiving Eve window, the NFL is giving the matchup a national stage before the holiday weekend’s heavier schedule begins, and it is doing so with two teams that have recent playoff history and enough star power to carry it.
There is still a natural tension beneath the shine. Green Bay’s 2025 playoff berth came with a five-game collapse to end the regular season, and the team’s most recent postseason trip did not change that arc. Fans looking for signs of a reset have reason to watch closely, especially after the injury return of Parsons and the uncertainty that always comes with a roster trying to turn promise into a sustained run. For the Rams, the challenge is different: another strong season has raised the bar, and a holiday showcase only sharpens the expectation that they should be able to play like a contender again.
For now, the key date is Thursday night. That is when the league will reveal the full map for 2026, and the Packers-Rams matchup will be one of the first signals of how the NFL plans to frame its newest holiday experiment.
