2QUESTION 2 OF 3
Answer & explanation
The official answer, with Fermi’s reasoning step by step.
Answer & explanation
Official answer
17,439
passes
How to estimate it
Fermi’s official “Napkin math”
Build it up. There are 32 NFL teams, and each plays 17 games. How many passes does a team throw in a game? Call it 35. Multiply the three together.
- NFL teams
- 32
- Games each
- × 17
- Passes per game
- × 35
- 32 × 17 × 35
- ≈ 19,000
Rounded assumptions may give a slightly different estimate. The official answer above is the game’s reference value.
Source calculation & reference
- 32 teams × 17 games
- = 544 team-games
- 2025 pass attempts (NFL.com)
- 17,439
Reference cited by Fermi: NFL.com official team passing stats
How close was your guess?
Your comparison will appear here.
Compare by ratio: divide the larger number by the smaller one. The closer to 1×, the better.