Super Bowls in Tampa

Tampa has hosted five Super Bowls, two at Tampa Stadium and three at Raymond James Stadium, according to the Tampa Sports Authority timeline.

Both host stadiums have been run by the same public agency, the Tampa Sports Authority, and the shift from the first to the second came between the third and fourth games on the list. The first Buccaneers game at Raymond James Stadium was played on September 20, 1998, so every Tampa Super Bowl since 2001 has been held there.

The five games put Tampa high on the list of host cities. When the NFL formally awarded Super Bowl LV, the Buccaneers wrote in October 2017 that Tampa trailed only Miami, New Orleans and Los Angeles in the total number of Super Bowls hosted. That ranking is dated to 2017 and has not been re-counted here.

The Los Angeles Raiders beat Washington 38-9 in Tampa's first Super Bowl, played at Tampa Stadium on January 22, 1984, according to NFL.com analyst Gil Brandt.

Brandt notes that the game came after only the Buccaneers' eighth season, and he credits Tom McEwen, the former sports editor of The Tampa Tribune, as instrumental in the city landing an NFL team in 1976 and, in his view, in bringing the first Super Bowl to town. The authority timeline dates the NFL franchise award to Tampa Bay to April 24, 1974 and the first Buccaneers game to August 21, 1976, when Miami won 28-21 before 67,466 people.

Brandt remembers Tampa Stadium, also known as the Big Sombrero, as a small venue for the event. On the field he singles out two plays. Marcus Allen's 74-yard touchdown run ranks No. 14 in the NFL 100 Greatest list of plays, and near the end of the first half linebacker Jack Squirek intercepted a Joe Theismann screen pass and returned it for a touchdown and a 21-3 Raiders lead. The win was the Raiders' second Super Bowl title as a franchise.

Super Bowl XXV, played on January 27, 1991, was the Wide Right game: the New York Giants beat the Buffalo Bills 20-19 in a game that ended with Bills kicker Scott Norwood's missed field goal attempt, as Brandt recounts.

The game was played during the Gulf War, and Brandt recalls extremely heavy security getting into Tampa Stadium. He also points to a touchdown-saving stop by Giants safety Everson Walls on Buffalo running back Thurman Thomas, a play then defensive coordinator Bill Belichick called the play of the game. It was the second Super Bowl win in Giants history.

Brandt also notes how fast the event had grown in seven years. He remembers every NFL owner of the time attending, which he doubts was true in 1984, and says Tampa had learned from its first turn as host city, so things ran much more smoothly. The Giants arrived in town late but still won. It was the last Super Bowl at Tampa Stadium; the next Tampa game, ten years later, moved to the new stadium.

The Baltimore Ravens beat the New York Giants 34-7 in Super Bowl XXXV on January 28, 2001, the first Super Bowl at Raymond James Stadium, behind a defensive performance led by game MVP Ray Lewis, according to the authority timeline.

Brandt calls the new stadium a huge leap from Tampa Stadium. He recalls a Giants interception return nullified by a holding penalty, back-to-back kickoff returns for touchdowns and a 38-yard scoring pass to Brandon Stokley. He also notes that Tampa's Gasparilla Parade and Pirate Festival was held at the same time as the 2001 game.

Super Bowl XLIII, on February 1, 2009, ended Pittsburgh Steelers 27, Arizona Cardinals 23, per the timeline. Brandt's account names three plays: James Harrison's interception return, which he puts at 101 yards; Larry Fitzgerald's 64-yard scoring catch with less than 3 minutes left; and the last-minute game-winning touchdown pass to Santonio Holmes.

NFL owners formally awarded Super Bowl LV to Tampa at their Fall League Meeting in New York City on October 19, 2017, after offering it in May on the condition that the city meet requirements tied to its bid, according to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

The club said the award followed substantial improvements to Raymond James Stadium, which was in the midst of a four-phase, $150 million renovation to be finished by the start of the 2018 season. The authority timeline instead lists a 2016 approval for $100 million in renovations. The two figures differ and neither source explains the gap, so both are given here.

The game was played during the COVID-19 pandemic. NFL.com reported the expected official attendance as 25,000 fans and 30,000 cardboard cutouts, the smallest attendance in Super Bowl history, with 7,500 of those fans being health care workers who received free tickets from the NFL. The City of Tampa kicked off a virtual Bucs Spirit Week one week before the game, and one of its daily themes in the January 31, 2021 post asked fans to share photos from the NFL Super Bowl Experience at Julian B. Lane Riverfront Park, Curtis Hixon, Technology Village and the Riverwalk.

On the field at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, the Buccaneers beat the Kansas City Chiefs 31-9 and became the first team to win a Super Bowl in their host stadium, NFL.com reported. Tom Brady won his seventh Super Bowl and fifth Super Bowl MVP award, Rob Gronkowski caught two first-half touchdown passes, and the Bucs lifted the franchise's second Lombardi Trophy.

Raymond James Stadium has hosted college championships, bowl games, wrestling and hockey, according to the Tampa Sports Authority timeline.

The timeline lists the College Football Playoff National Championship on January 9, 2017; the first Outback Bowl at the stadium on January 1, 1999; the first Gasparilla Bowl there on December 20, 2018; WrestleMania 37 over two nights, April 10 and 11, 2021; and the NHL Stadium Series game between the Tampa Bay Lightning and Boston Bruins on February 1, 2026. The authority also manages Raymond James Stadium on behalf of Hillsborough County, which received ownership from it on December 19, 2003.

The stadium has also been a college football home. The timeline records that the University of South Florida Bulls signed a 10-year agreement with the authority on October 20, 1995, played their first football game at Houlihan Stadium on September 6, 1997, and opened at Raymond James Stadium on October 3, 1998 with a 45-6 win over the Citadel. The Buccaneers had signed a lease with the authority running through 2000 on April 27, 1990.

No sixth Tampa Super Bowl appears on that timeline, which runs through events scheduled for June 2026. Anyone checking whether Tampa has been awarded a future game should look for a formal NFL owners vote, the step the Buccaneers described for Super Bowl LV, rather than bid reports.

Last verified: October 18, 2026, against the Tampa Sports Authority timeline, three NFL.com articles on the Tampa Super Bowls, the Buccaneers' 2017 award announcement and the City of Tampa's Super Bowl LV Spirit Week post.