A Clip-'n'-Save 50+ Yard Field Goal Conversion Rate Chart

How much harder is a 59-yard field goal than a 53-yarder? Let's comb through three years of data to find out.

Your team is on the opponent’s 38-yard line with 18 seconds left in a tie game. You have a timeout left, so you can safely run another play. Your kicker is a healthy, established veteran. The weather is fine.

How aggressive will you be?

If you gain zero yards, a 56-yard field goal attempt could win the game. We all know 50+ yard field goals, and now 60+ yard field goals, have become almost stunningly makeable. But what’s the league average on 56-yard conversions? Official sources only list 50-plus yard conversion rates. There are tons of “easy” 51-yard attempts in that data. How much harder is a 56-yarder than a 51-yarder? Should you play for five yards, or risk an incompletion/calamity to try to gain 20?

The Packers faced this dilemma in the waning seconds of regulation against the Cowboys. They reached the Cowboys 40-yard line with 17 seconds left and all three timeouts. They handed off to Josh Jacobs twice to get to the 35-yard line, where Brandon McManus split the uprights.

The Seahawks chose a similar conservative approach twice last Thursday night. They reached the 37-yard line late in the fourth quarter, but Jason Myers’ 53-yard attempt sailed wide right. In the waning seconds, they reached the 38-yard line, then handed off to Kenneth Walker, who fought for four yards. Myers’ 52-yarder won the game.

It turns out that those four yards the Packers and Seahawks gained were very important from a probabilistic standpoint.

Here is a handy chart for conversion rates of 50-plus yards. Feel free to print it, clip it, and save it in your wallet, cellphone case or on your fridge:

Distance Conversion Rate

50 yards 73.6%

51 73.8%

52 74.5%

53 74.0%

54 72.6%

55 68.6%

56 65.6%

57 63.6%

58 62.9%

59 60.4%

60 53.9%

61 49.2%

62+ 46.2%

The rates above are based on the Stathead results for every field goal attempt from 2023 through Week 3 of 2025 at every yard line from the opponent’s 31 through midfield.

The yard lines were “clumped” into three-yard groups. So for a 50-yard field goal, all of the attempts from the 31-through-33 yard lines were tabulated. For a 51-yard field goal, all attempts from the 32-through-34 were tabulated. And so on. This method increases sample sizes and smooths the data. It also accounts for the fact that attempts from the 32-yard line are variously counted as 50 and 51-yarders (with a stray 49 or two) in the official play-by-play.

The resulting conversation rates were still a little jagged, so I clumped them data again with the surrounding yard lines. So the 50-yard data set now includes 48-yard attempts once, 49-to-51-yard attempts twice each, and 52-yard attempts once.

The results still have a weird little blip where conversion rates increase a bit as attempts grow longer before decreasing. That may be selection bias: coaches are less likely to try a 50+ yarder if they don’t trust the kicker, so there are more 49-yarders by Jake Moody-types in the data for shorter attempts. A quick scan reveals that names like Lucas Havrisik and Matt Ammendola mostly disappear from the sample once the attempts push into the mid-50-yard range.

In fact, there’s also a likely Survivor Bias in the data, as we shall see in a moment.

The data shows a pronounced uptick in conversion rate at the 53-yard range. You really want to get to the 35-yard line! The television red line hovers around the 37-yard line, which is fine, but there are a few precious percentage points to be had by getting a yard or two closer.

Outside the 40-yard line, conversation rates plummet to the point that some coaches (read: Brian Callahan) need to explore other options rather than just sending the kicker out there, unless it’s the end of the half or game.

Once we hit about 59 yards, our sample contains a powerful Survivor Bias. Most of the available data in the long-distance range comes from a handful of kickers: mostly Brandon Aubrey and Harrison Butker, with some Chris Boswell and Jake Elliott, then a heavy dusting of random kickers attempting “Why not?” field goals before halftime.

From the 40-to-42 yard lines, kickers in our sample were 25-of-43, before any additional clumping. Remove just Aubrey and Butker, and they went just 17-of-33. My clustering technique means that the Aubrey/Butker/Elliott/Boswell attempts get counted again and again in the data set as we approach and eclipse 60 yards. These veterans are also disproportionally represented from 50-to-59 yards, though some slumping veterans (Younghoe Koo, Justin Tucker) are also in that data.

For a normal kicker, I would assume a conversion rate just shy of 50% at 60-yards, and dropping significantly with every yard.

So the Packers and Seahawks were onto something when they handed off to reach the 35-yard line. I’d prefer to see teams be more aggressive, perhaps at least trying to get the ball in space in search of a 20-yard chunk and a chipshot. But the handoffs earned mathematically-useful yardage while reducing the risk of a sack/turnover/holding penalty. They also probably set the kicker up on his preferred hashmark.

Now we have some hard data to work with when assessing strategies from the 35-45 yard line. That 74% success rate when you reach the 35-yard line looks like a rather reliable “shelf” that’s worth aiming for. It’s also a number we can use for judging struggling kickers: a 60% success rate from 50-to-55 yards is indeed “below average,” though I wouldn’t suggest cutting a guy who is 3-of-5.

Tune in next September, when I will probably have to expand the table to include 70-yarders.

Too Deep Housecleaning: The Tanier family is taking care of some scheduled medical stuff this week. Barring sudden inspiration or Kirk Cousins trade-level news, I might not post again until next Monday’s Walkthrough. Thank you for your patience and continued support!

Jake Elliott. By Quintin3265 via Creative Commons Share-Alike.