The two teams were tied on points at the end of the season, so the goal difference decided the title.
Had the current three-points-for-a-win system been in use instead of the standard two-points-for-a-win that was used at the time, Velež Mostar would have been champions with 64 points, while Hajduk would have been be second with 63.
A total of eighteen teams contested the league, including sixteen sides from the 1972–73 season and two sides promoted from the 1972–73 Yugoslav Second League (YSL) as winners of the two second level divisions East and West.
The two clubs promoted to top level were Proleter Zrenjanin and NK Zagreb.
FK Velež player Vahid Halilhodžić, whose team spent the spring of 1974 in a tight league title race with Hajduk Split, alleged in a 2023 interview that Hajduk fixed its last 1973-74 league match away at OFK Beograd (Hajduk won 0-2) while further insinuating that the approach took place through OFK goalkeeper Petar Borota.