Editing Playoffs (section)

=== United States and Canada ===
{{main|MLS Cup Playoffs}}

In [[Major League Soccer]], the top flight in the United States and Canada, the [[MLS Cup Playoffs]] are contested after the end of the [[regular season]] by the top teams in each conference. The winner of the [[MLS Cup]], the final match in the playoffs, is considered the league's champion for that season.<ref name="MLS-Overview"/><ref name="ALJ-MLS">{{cite news |last=Harb |first=Ali |date=28 August 2023 |title=Lionel Messi makes MLS debut: How does the league work? |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/sports/2023/8/28/lionel-messi-makes-mls-debut-but-how-does-the-league-work |work=Al Jazeera |accessdate=3 March 2024}}</ref> The number of teams that qualify has varied: from the [[2012 Major League Soccer season|2012 season]] to the [[2014 Major League Soccer season|2014 season]], the top five teams in each of its two conferences played in the playoffs; this was increased to six teams from 2015 to 2018 and later seven teams in the [[2019 Major League Soccer season|2019 season]], which also switched all rounds to single-elimination matches. Under this system, the conferences have separate playoff brackets.

Since the [[2023 MLS Cup Playoffs|2023 edition]], the MLS Cup Playoffs have had nine teams from each conference playing in separate brackets until the MLS Cup final. The preliminary round has the eighth seed hosting the ninth seed while the top seven seeds get a prelim-round bye. Whoever wins plays the top seed in Round One. In Round One, the top-seed hosts the eighth-ninth winner, the runner-up hosts the seventh seed, the third hosts the sixth, and the fourth hosts the fifth, in [[best-of-three]] games. The remaining rounds (the conference semifinals, conference final, and MLS Cup final) are single-elimination matches hosted by the team with the better regular season record.<ref name="ALJ-MLS"/> 62 percent of teams make the playoff under this new format.<ref>{{cite news |last=Rosenblatt |first=Ryan |date=13 June 2023 |title=Baseball fields, playoffs, snow and All-Star Games: What new things await Lionel Messi in MLS? |url=https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_/id/37839435/mls-quirks-await-messi-inter-miami-playoffs-baseball-fields-snow-turf |publisher=ESPN |accessdate=3 March 2024}}</ref>

Since 2012, the MLS Cup has been hosted by the conference champion that has the most table points during the regular season.

In the case of ties after regulation in any round, 30 minutes of extra time (divided into two 15-minute periods) would be played followed by a penalty-kick shootout, if necessary, to determine the winners.

The defunct [[Women's Professional Soccer]] (WPS), which operated only in the U.S., conducted a four-team stepladder tournament consisting of one-off knockout matches. The third seed hosted the fourth seed in the first round. The winner of that game advanced to the "Super Semifinal", hosted by the second seed. The Super Semifinal winner traveled to the top seed for the final. The WPS's replacement, the [[National Women's Soccer League]] (which launched in 2013), uses a single elimination tournament.  The current [[NWSL playoffs|NWSL playoff]] structure has a more standard eight-team knockout playoff where the top-seed hosts the eighth, the runner-up hosts the seventh, the third-ranked team plays the sixth-ranked, and the fourth plays the fifth. The lowest-seeded winner from the quarterfinals plays the highest-seeded and the next-lowest the next-highest team in the semifinals. The winners of two one-off semifinals advance to the one-off final. From 2021 to 2023, the NWSL had a 6-team tournament; and from 2013 to 2019, it had a 4-team single elimination tournament.