How to recruit in College Football 25

The first step to building a Dynasty in College Football 25 is recruiting the best prospects for your program. The latest NCAA Football title features an in-depth recruitment system, which lets you assess your options, scout players, and approach them with an offer.

While the process may sound straightforward, recruiting prospects is anything but. So if you’re wondering how to sign the best talents, here’s how to recruit in College Football 25.

College Football 25 recruitment explained

Recruitment in College Football 25 works in three phases: Discovery, Pitch, and Close. For the first phase, you’ll need to go to the Recruitment menu from the Dynasty hub and then navigate to the Prospect List tab.

Here, you’ll have access to a long list of prospects. Next to their names, you’ll find profiles detailing their Rank, Rating, interest in joining your team, and how close they are to selecting their preferred college. Some players will also have a ‘Need’ indicator next to their name, which means they belong to a position you need to fill.

The list has more than 3,500 players to pick from, so select the profiles you like the most to shortlist them on your Recruitment Board. Hit the left bumper to bring up the board, and you can now start scouting these talents.

To scout individual players, you’ll need to spend 10 hours from your total Recruitment Hours. The amount of hours given to you depends on the prestige of your school, with 5-star teams getting over 1000 hours while minnows can get as low as 350. It takes three scouting sessions, or 30 hours, to reveal the Physical and Mental abilities, Attributes, and Development traits of a player.

Once you’re done scouting a prospect, you’ll have a better idea of whether or not you want to offer them a Scholarship. If you’re set on recruiting a player, you’ll need to make sure that you match their demands. This is where Dealbreakers come in, as they’re essential requirements that you must match to have a chance at recruiting the player.

Dealbreakers are based on School Grades which you can check out by going to the ‘My School’ tab. Here, you’ll find grades rating different attributes for your school, these include:

• Playing Time
• Playing Style
• Championship Contender
• Program Tradition
• Campus Lifestyle
• Stadium Atmosphere
• Pro Potential
• Brand Exposure
• Academic Prestige
• Conference Prestige
• Coach Prestige
• Coach Stability
• Athletic Facilities
• Proximity to Home

Most of these attributes are linked to your success on the field, so you can improve the overall grade throughout the season. That said, there’s no way to improve the grades assigned to Campus Lifestyle and Academic Prestige.

How to recruit in Dynasty mode

To start the recruiting process in College Football 25, offer your shortlisted prospect a Scholarship. This action will take away five hours from your time allotment. Once that’s done, advance the time and return to the Recruiting Board to see where the prospect is in the process of selecting their preferred school.

In their profile section, you’ll get an overview of where your program ranks in their Top Schools. The higher the rank, the better chance you have at recruiting them. To help boost your ranking, you can try out these actions that increase the influence of your college:

• Search Social Media – 5 hours
• DM The Player – 10 hours
• Contact Friends and Family – 25 hours
• Send The House – 50 hours

Advance time again to see the effect your selected action had on the player. The goal is to remain high in the rankings every week until the prospect narrows it down to their Top 5 schools. If you manage to make the cutoff, you can select one of these options to further increase your influence:

• Soft Sell – 20 hours 
• Hard Sell – 40 hours
• Sway – 30 hours

The final part of recruiting a prospect is the Schedule Visit option. This will take away 40 hours from your team’s allocation and is selectable once the player has nailed down their Top 5 colleges. You’ll have the option to pick your pitch strategy. The choices are based on the attributes your school has been graded on, and you should aim to pick those that are linked to the player’s Dealbreaker and requirements.

If the visit is successful, you’ll make it to their Top 3 schools. Advance time further and eventually you’ll get a verbal commitment from the player, allowing you to sign them to your program. Repeat the process throughout coaching journey, and eventually, you’ll master College Football 25’s recruiting system.

Best recruiting tips in College Football 25

Upgrade your coach

To have a better chance at signing top prospects, invest your Coach Points in the Elite Recruiter ability tree. Spending here will result in boosts to your recruiting actions, scouting times, and pipeline bonuses.

Scout thoroughly

Scouting doesn’t just reveal the player’s abilities and whether they’re a gem or bust, but it also unveils their characteristics. By completing the process, you’ll get a clear picture of what the player is looking for and how your school’s grades fare in those areas. Depending on their characteristics, you can adjust your pitch strategy when it is time to Schedule a Visit.

Needs come first

It’s tempting to shortlist the 5-star prospects and begin swaying them to your side, but you’ll face competition from the biggest teams while attempting to do so. This can result in wasting a ton of hours while chasing an unattainable player.

As an alternative, focus on 4-star prospects in positions that your team requires. This way, you’ll be working towards plugging holes in your program and you might just unearth a gem after scouting them.

Keep an eye on Dealbreakers

If you cannot match a prospect’s Dealbreaker, it’s not worth chasing after them. For instance, a prospect who’s looking for an A- in Proximity to Home will not relocate to your college no matter its prestige. When you encounter this situation, it’s best to move on to other candidates and spend your valuable hours on them instead.

How to increase recruitment hours

The best way to increase recruitment hours from the jump is by selecting the Recruiter archetype for your head coach, or your offensive or defensive coordinator. No matter the prestige of your school, you’ll start preseason with more hours compared to any other archetype.

Aside from this, you can invest in the Always Be Crootin’ ability found within the Recruiter skill tree. You’ll have to purchase the ability separately for each position, but in return, your recruitment hours will get a boost. The ability costs five Coach Points per position.

Before investing too much time into a Dynasty save, check out how to use your custom team using Team Builder and the best settings for offense and defense.