Handball-Bundesliga

Bundesliga

Current season, competition or edition: 2024–25 Handball-Bundesliga
Sport	Handball
Founded	1966; 58 years ago (1966)
First season	1966–67
Administrator	Deutscher Handballbund (DHB)
No. of teams	18
Country	Germany
Confederation	EHF
Most recent champion(s)	SC Magdeburg (3rd title) (2023–24)
Most titles	THW Kiel (23 titles)
TV partner(s)	Dyn
Sponsor(s)	Daikin
Level on pyramid	Level 1
Relegation to	2. Handball-Bundesliga
Domestic cup(s)	DHB-Pokal DHB-Supercup
International cup(s)	EHF Champions League EHF European League
Official website	daikin-hbl.de

The Handball-Bundesliga (HBL) is the top German professional handball league. From 2007 onwards, the league was sponsored by Toyota and has officially been called the Toyota Handball-Bundesliga. This lasted until 2012 when the Deutsche Kreditbank AG (DKB)^[1] became the new sponsor. From 2024 onwards, the league was sponsored by Daikin. The official name has consequently been changed to Daikin Handball-Bundesliga. The winners of the respective season are the official German handball champions. HBL is headquartered in Dortmund.

The Bundesliga was introduced with the 1966/67 season and initially operated with two regional sections, North and South. Since 1977 the Bundesliga has operated with a single section first division, currently composed of eighteen clubs. In 1981 a 2.Bundesliga was introduced as a new second division, supplanting the Regionalliga which became the third tier. The 2.Bundesliga used to consist of two (resp. three in the first two years after the German reunification) sections north and south for thirty years. Starting with the 2011/12 season the 2.Bundesliga is run in a single section consisting of twenty teams.

The season has 34 game days (or weeks) and is played as a round-robin tournament without playoffs or a final. The season starts in August or September and ends in May.

The first and second-placed teams are entitled to play in the EHF Champions League the following season. The third, fourth, fifth and sixth-placed teams additionally play in the EHF European League. The seedings are subject to change, in case a German team wins the Champions League, the EHF European League or the EHF Cup Winner's Cup because each winner of those tournaments is granted an automatic start in the next year's tournament without taking one of the league's spots. It also can change if the DHB-Pokal Champion takes one of the league spots for the Champions League or the EHF European League.

Until 2011, the two last placed teams would be relegated to the 2. Handball-Bundesliga for the next season, either in its northern or the southern section. The sixteenth placed team used to play in a home and away decider against the winner of the decider between the two-second placed teams of the northern and the southern section of the 2. Bundesliga. The champions of the second divisions received a spot for the Bundesliga automatically.

Since the 2017–18 season, the bottom two teams of the Bundesliga will directly be relegated to the 2. Bundesliga, while the top two teams of the 2. Bundesliga will be directly promoted to the Bundesliga.

Members of the 2024–25 Handball-Bundesliga.

Potsdam

Bietigheim

Berlin

Erlangen

Flensburg

Hamburg

Göppingen

Hannover

Kiel

Leipzig

Lemgo

Magdeburg

Melsungen

Eisenach

Gummersbach

RN Löwen

Stuttgart

Wetzlar

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Locations of the 2024–25 Handball-Bundesliga teams

The complete list of the German handball champions since 1950.

The following data indicates German coefficient rankings between European handball leagues.

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

• DHB-Pokal
• DHB-Supercup
• Handball-Bundesliga (women)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Handball-Bundesliga.

• Official website (in German and English)
• Statistics of the HBL