Short answers, pulled from the story.
The new Highmark Stadium is estimated to cost $1.7 billion. After a $300 million cost increase reported in August 2023 due to higher labor and material prices, the Bills' ownership is contractually obligated to cover the overrun under the terms of the agreement.
Taxpayers are contributing $850 million toward Highmark Stadium's construction: $600 million from New York State and $250 million from Erie County. New York State will also pay all maintenance and repair costs after the stadium opens, making it the largest public contribution ever for an NFL facility.
The new Highmark Stadium is scheduled to open for the 2026 NFL season. The stadium's steel structure was topped out on the 4th of April 2025, and the Bills plan to replace Ralph Wilson Stadium as their home field starting that year.
The new Highmark Stadium has a seating capacity of 60,108. That makes it the smallest NFL venue by seating capacity, and it is roughly 12,000 seats fewer than the existing Highmark Stadium it will replace.
Populous designed the new Highmark Stadium. The firm previously designed Sahlen Field in downtown Buffalo and twelve other active NFL stadiums, and the new Orchard Park stadium shares numerous design elements with those venues.
The new Highmark Stadium will not have a roof, which makes it ineligible to host the Super Bowl. About 65 percent of seats are designed to be protected from the elements. Civic leaders in Buffalo accepted the open-air design partly because of the city's identity around cold-weather football.