The NHL and NHL Players' Association agreed on Thursday to a 24-team playoff format for the 2020 postseason, according to ESPN's Emily Kaplan.
The postseason will kick off with a 24-team qualifying round, which will feature a best-of-five series. The top four teams in each conference will automatically advance, though they will play separate round-robin tournaments to determine seeding in the first round, per ESPN's Greg Wyshynski. The remaining 16 teams will then play the best-of-five series, with the eight winners joining the eight teams that automatically advanced.
Once the 16-team field is set, the playoffs will continue with the traditional set of four, seven-game rounds.