The 1989 NCAA Division I-AA football season, part of college football in the United States organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association at the Division I-AA level, began in August 1989, and concluded with the 1989 NCAA Division I-AA Football Championship Game on December 16, 1989, at Paulson Stadium in Statesboro, Georgia.

The Georgia Southern Eagles won their third I-AA championship, defeating the Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks by a score of 37−34.

[1] Big Sky Conference – Idaho Colonial League – Holy Cross Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference – Southwest Missouri State Ivy League – Princeton and Yale Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference – Delaware State Ohio Valley Conference – Middle Tennessee State Southern Conference – Furman Southland Conference – Stephen F. Austin Southwestern Athletic Conference – Jackson State Yankee Conference – Connecticut, Maine, and Villanova The top four teams were seeded, and thus assured of home games in the opening round.

[2] The location of the final, the Georgia Southern Eagles' Paulson Stadium, had been predetermined via a three-year agreement the university reached with the NCAA in February 1989.

[3] * Denotes host institution