Which college football coach has the most national championships (7)?

Which college football coach has the most national championships (7)? Nick Saban has the most claimed national championships by a college football head coach, with seven.

Saban won his first national title at LSU in the 2003 season. He then built Alabama into the dominant program of the 21st century, winning championships in 2009, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2017, and 2020. His Alabama teams also made repeated appearances in the BCS Championship Game and College Football Playoff National Championship.

The number requires a small historical qualification because college football has no single championship game or universally accepted selector across its entire history. Saban’s seven titles are the claimed championships generally recognized in the major record books. Alabama also had a 2016 title selected by the Colley Matrix, but that championship is commonly treated as unclaimed and is not included in the standard total.

Saban’s total surpassed Bear Bryant’s six widely recognized national championships. He also became the first coach in the modern poll era to win national championships with two different FBS programs.