2017–18 NIFL Premiership

The 2017–18 NIFL Premiership (known as the Danske Bank Premiership for sponsorship reasons) will be the 117th season of the Irish League overall and the fifth as the Northern Ireland Football League.

Linfield are the defending champions.

The winner qualifies for the 2018–19 UEFA Champions League while the runner-up along with potentially the third-placed team and the play-off winners will qualify for the 2018–19 UEFA Europa League.

Teams
Twelve teams will compete in the 2017–18 NIFL Premiership. Portadown were relegated after finishing bottom of the 2016–17 NIFL Premiership and were replaced by Warrenpoint Town as the winners of the 2016–17 NIFL Championship.

Carrick Rangers finished second from bottom but retained their Premiership place after winning the promotion-relegation play-off against NIFL Championship promotion play-off winners Institute 5–2 on aggregate.

Matches 1–22
During matches 1–22 each team played every other team twice (home and away).

Matches 23–33
During matches 23–33 each team played every other team for the third time (either at home, or away).

Matches 34–38
During matches 34–38 each team played every other team in their half of the table once. As this was the fourth time that teams played each other this season, home sides were chosen so that they will have played each other twice at home and twice away.

UEFA Europa League play-offs
Teams finishing fourth to seventh will take part in Europa League play-offs to decide one team who will qualify for next season's Europa League first qualifying round.

Pre-play-off
The runners-up and third-placed teams from the Championship will take part (over two legs) in the Championship promotion pre-play-off.

Play-off
The eleventh-placed team from the Premiership will play the winners of the pre-play-off over two legs for one spot in the 2018–19 NIFL Premiership.