Under Sonny Dykes, TCU football has gone from battling out 5-6 win seasons to making the national championship in just his first year. On top of that, recruiting has been phenomenal, the transfer portal mechanism is well in place, and the program is dominating the Big 12. A high-profile contract extension for Dykes was probably long overdue, and it finally comes today.

According to reports, Dykes has agreed to a new contract that also includes a multi-year extension. Previously Dykes’ contract was running through 2028, and his salary this year was expected to be more than $7 million. However, with the new contract announcement, Dykes may yet become one of the highest-paid coaches in the country.

What is Sonny Dykes’ new salary in 2026?

Dykes has compiled a 36-17 record with TCU, and the 2025 season was pivotal for his job security. But Dykes finally showed dominance last year and finished with a 9-win season. The Horned Frogs even defeated USC in the Alamo Bowl in overtime and also defeated teams like Baylor and West Virginia. The contract extension now shows the renewed faith TCU hierarchy has in Dykes, and the payout will be in that spirit, too.

Currently, Texas A&M’s Mike Elko is on an $11 million-per-year deal and is the seventh-highest-paid head coach in the country. Even the Missouri Tigers’ Eli Drinkwitz earns $10.75 million annually. But since TCU doesn’t have the financial muscle of SEC teams, and Dykes has no interest in other programs or NFL teams, his new payout should be around $8.5 to $9 million annually this year. Earning even that much will still make him one of the top-15 highest-paid head coaches in the country.

All about the TCU football head coach’s new contract extension

For the 2025 season, Dykes earned a total of $7 million in compensation, which also included performance bonuses and other guaranteed pay. That deal ran through 2028 as Dykes became the head coach to win the most Big 12 games (36) than any other Big 12 program since 2012. The TCU hierarchy was in talks with Dykes’ agency and relayed the updates a month ago in February.

“Sonny was laser-focused in the end-of-year review of the program and made a number of difficult decisions with the goal of bringing TCU back to the College Football Playoff,” TCU AD Mike Buddie wrote in his Newsletter in February. “We are currently in talks to extend Coach Dykes’ contract, and I will have more to share on that very soon.”

Sonny Dykes has stayed involved in the process throughout and has been negotiating for more than a month now. He himself had announced it a few days back in March. “I think we’re there. And I think we’re getting close,” Dykes said on the first day of TCU’s spring camp. “I think we’re there, but the legal stuff is getting all sorted out.”

TCU will now likely extend Dykes’ contract to 2030 and will keep a two-year option to extend it by triggering a clause. That would give the program long-term stability and also allow Dykes to build a national title-winning roster as he did in 2022. Of course, all of this remains speculation for now, and we still await the final details of his contract.