Probably not, but the question is more nuanced than it sounds. Helmets are genuinely effective at preventing skull fractures, bleeding inside the skull, and death. What they don’t do well is prevent concussions. And there’s real evidence that wearing a helmet changes how players hit each other, potentially increasing the total number of head impacts over the course of a season. So the honest answer is that removing helmets entirely would trade one set of injuries for another, but training without helmets part of the time appears to make the game meaningfully safer.
What Helmets Actually Protect Against
A football helmet has two main components: a hard outer shell that spreads impact force over a larger area, and a foam inner layer that slows the head’s deceleration so the stop isn’t as abrupt. Together, these are very effective at preventing the kinds of injuries caused by direct, straight-on force. Skull fractures and intracranial bleeding dropped dramatically after hard-shell helmets became standard equipment.
Concussions, though, are a different biomechanical problem. Most concussions result from rotational forces, where the head is struck at an angle and the brain twists slightly inside the skull. The skull accelerates on impact while the brain lags behind due to its own inertia, creating strain within the tissue. A hard shell and foam padding do very little to counteract that rotational movement. This is why players still get concussions despite wearing increasingly sophisticated helmets: the helmet addresses the wrong type of force for that injury.
The Risk Compensation Problem
Here’s where the argument for removing helmets gains real traction. When players wear protective equipment, they tend to play more aggressively. Researchers call this risk compensation: the gear creates a sense of security that removes natural inhibitions against leading with the head or absorbing hits to it. Without a helmet, you instinctively protect your skull. With one, the head becomes a weapon.
This pattern has shown up across multiple sports. When football, hockey, and lacrosse mandated headgear, players became more willing to strike and absorb blows to the head, because scalp pain and lacerations were no longer an immediate deterrent. The concern is straightforward: if every player treats head contact as “no longer off limits,” the total number of collisions to the head goes up, and concussion totals may rise with them, even though each individual hit is somewhat cushioned.
What Happened Before Helmets
The early history of football offers a cautionary tale against going helmetless. In the early 1900s, before hard-shell helmets existed, football was extraordinarily dangerous. Newspapers ran headlines like “A Student Killed at Football” and “Dead From Football Injuries.” In 1910 alone, 14 players died, with concussion listed as the leading cause of death by a wide margin. Harvard’s team doctors documented 19 concussions in a single season and noted that only two games all year were played without one occurring. These weren’t elite professionals absorbing hits from 250-pound linemen. The game was slower, the players smaller, and people were still dying regularly.
This is the core problem with simply removing helmets. The sport evolved with helmets on. Players are bigger, faster, and stronger than at any point in football history. Removing the one piece of equipment that reliably prevents skull fractures and fatal brain bleeds would almost certainly bring back catastrophic injuries that have been largely eliminated.
The Helmetless Training Approach
Researchers have found a middle path that captures the behavioral benefits of going helmetless without the catastrophic risk. A study published in the Journal of Athletic Training tested a “helmetless tackling training” program with college football players. During certain practice drills, players removed their helmets to learn proper tackling form, reinforcing the instinct to keep the head out of contact. They wore helmets during all actual games and scrimmages.
The results were striking. Players who went through the helmetless training experienced 28% fewer head impacts per session by the end of the season compared to where they started. They also had 30% fewer head impacts than a control group that practiced only in full gear. The behavioral change carried over into helmeted play: once players learned to tackle without leading with their heads, they kept doing it when the helmets went back on.
Rugby Doesn’t Settle the Debate
People often point to rugby as proof that football would be safer without helmets, since rugby players don’t wear them and the sport has its own full-contact culture. But the data is more complicated than the talking point suggests. A prospective study comparing American college football and club rugby found concussion rates of 1.0 per 1,000 athlete exposures in football versus 2.5 per 1,000 in rugby. Rugby players actually sustained concussions at more than double the rate.
This comparison has limits. The sports have different rules, different tackling mechanics, and different body types at the elite level. Rugby’s rules prohibit blocking and enforce tackling technique in ways football doesn’t. But the numbers undercut the simple claim that removing helmets automatically means fewer concussions. It’s the combination of rules, technique, and culture that determines how often heads get hit.
Better Helmets Are Making a Difference
While helmets can’t fully solve the concussion problem, newer designs are narrowing the gap. The NFL began requiring padded outer shells called Guardian Caps during preseason practices for certain positions. An analysis of NFL practice data from 2018 to 2023 found that required use of the Guardian Cap was associated with a 54% to 62% reduction in practice concussions among affected positions.
Interestingly, when researchers looked only at concussions involving direct hits to the helmet shell (rather than the facemask), the Guardian Cap’s protective effect was not statistically significant. This suggests the reduction may involve behavioral changes, not just better padding. Players may tackle differently when wearing the bulkier cap, or the cap may reduce incidental facemask contact. Either way, the overall concussion reduction was large and consistent.
Why the Answer Is “Both”
The evidence points toward a strategy that uses helmets and incorporates helmetless training. Helmets remain essential for preventing the most severe outcomes: skull fractures, brain bleeds, and death. No serious researcher is proposing that NFL players line up on Sundays without head protection. But the behavioral effect of helmets is real. Players hit harder and more recklessly with a helmet on, and that recklessness drives concussion numbers up in ways the helmet itself can’t counteract.
The most promising approach combines protective equipment with technique training that teaches players to keep their heads out of collisions entirely. Helmetless tackling drills reduced head impacts by nearly a third in just one season. Rule changes that penalize head-first contact push in the same direction. The safest version of football isn’t one without helmets. It’s one where players are trained to play as if they aren’t wearing them.