The regular season uses a double round-robin format, in which each team plays the others home and away.

It trialled a new system in 2007–08 explicitly designed to prevent a losing team from earning more than one bonus point in a match,[2] a system that also made it impossible for either team to earn a bonus point in a drawn match.

The final was then played on neutral ground, and the winner earned the second ticket to the next Top 14.

As noted above, both promotion places will be determined by play-offs from 2017–18 forward, with the winner of the Pro D2 play-offs earning promotion and the runner-up playing the second-from-bottom Top 14 team for the next season's final Top 14 place.

[5] Normally, the teams that finish in 15th and 16th places in the table are relegated to Nationale at the end of the season.