Step 1 of the National League System
In English non-league football, there is a pyramid with six steps. The National League is the top tier of non-league football or step one. It is the fifth tier of the English game and step one in the non-league pyramid. Twenty-four teams in the National League compete for promotion and relegation.
In 2015, the league changed its name from the Football Conference to the National League. However, the fifth tier began its life in 1979 as the Alliance Premier League, with teams joining the league from the Northern Premier League and the Southern League. The Alliance Premier League came to fruition just in time for the start of the 1979/80 campaign.
It is claimed that the standard of the fifth tier improved with the advent of the league. This was acknowledged in 1986, as the EFL agreed to allow promotion directly into the fourth tier of the English game from the non-league’s top tier.
The league feeds into the EFL, with two teams each season moving up to League Two, one automatically via finishing at the top of the table and also one team going up via the six-team play-offs, which are competed in by the teams that finish from second in the table to seventh place.
At the other end of the scale, the four teams who finish from 21st to 24th in the league table are relegated to the National League North and National League South.