NCAA Approves CFB 2-Minute Warning, Helmet Communication, More for 2024 Season

The NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel has approved several rule changes ahead of the 2024 college football season, it announced Friday.

College football will now feature a two-minute warning timeout in the second and fourth quarters, like the NFL's rule.

The NCAA also approved a rule for in-helmet communication devices for FBS teams. Each school will now have the option to use coach-to-player communication devices in helmets for one player on the field, who will be identified by a green dot on their helmet.

Non-FBS conferences interested in using wearable technologies can submit an experimental proposal to the committee.

Teams across all three divisions will also now have the option to use tablets to view in-game video. Teams can have up to 18 tablets in the coaching booth, sideline and locker room.

Adding a two-minute warning at the end of each half will likely have a noticeable impact this season. With the new rule, teams with a lead will have a little more trouble running out the clock, so teams playing from behind will have a better chance to mount a comeback.

As The Athletic's Chris Vannini wrote, the two-minute warning "will be a fixed point for a media timeout but not a new media timeout."

"This is not a new or additional timeout," rules committee co-chair and Big Ten VP of football administration A.J. Edds said in March, per Vannini. "This is a known position that will hopefully alleviate the impression early in the quarters where media partners have taken breaks in consecutive opportunities. This will give them a larger runway over the second and fourth quarters."

Adding in-helmet communication has been a topic of conversation over the last year and was amplified by the Michigan sign-stealing scandal—though the Big Ten proposed the rule last summer, before the sign-stealing saga.

While the wearable technology will make play-calling much easier, many teams will likely still use sideline signals, especially those that use uptempo offenses.

Like the two-minute warning and wearable technology, tablets on the sideline are commonplace in the NFL. While the NCAA's new rule is similar to that of the NFL, it differs slightly in that it allows video rather than just still images.