WNBA Proposal: Historic Salaries and Sustainable Growth
The Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) has presented a new proposal to the Women’s National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA) that could revolutionize the league’s salary structure. This proposal, according to sources, includes a guaranteed maximum salary of $1 million in 2026. In addition, revenue sharing is projected to raise the total earnings of maximum-salaried players to over $1.2 million. According to the proposal, the average salary of the players in 2026 would exceed $500,000, and the minimum salary would be above $225,000. The salary cap would increase to $5 million in 2026 and would be established annually based on the growth of revenue.Although the players’ response to this latest proposal is still unknown, an agreement does not seem imminent. Both parties agreed to extend the current collective bargaining agreement until January 9, 2026. The extension, proposed by the union, was accepted by the league after initially requesting a 21-day extension.
These new figures represent increases over the league’s previous proposal, which was announced on November 18: more than $1.1 million in total compensation (base salary plus revenue sharing) for players with maximum salaries, an average compensation of more than $460,000, and minimum salaries above $220,000.
A proposal from the league on November 23 included a maximum base salary of more than $1 million. In 2025, the league minimum salary was $66,079, the supermax $249,244, and the salary cap $1,507,100, with a fixed annual increase of 3% according to the agreement. The current agreement also includes a separate revenue sharing provision that grants direct payments to players if the league reaches certain revenue targets, although this has not yet happened, largely due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The WNBPA has been pushing for a system where the salary cap, and therefore player salaries, is more directly linked to business growth, as in the NBA, where the salary cap is determined directly by basketball-related income (BRI). Both sides arrived at the new extension, a bit longer than the previous 30 days agreed upon at the end of October, with the hope that it will provide a real path to achieve significant progress towards a new agreement, and ideally even achieve one before January 9th.
