The Texans compete as members of the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) for 12 of their 14 varsity sports.

During the school's four-year transition to full D-I membership, set to end in July 2024, Tarleton has planned to add several sports, with women's soccer the first to be confirmed, eventually launching in 2022.

[3][4] Tarleton next added beach volleyball, a women-only sport at the NCAA level, in the 2024 season (2023–24 school year), competing as a single-sport member of Conference USA.

[6][7] Before joining the WAC in July 2020, Tarleton had been a member of the NCAA Division II Lone Star Conference (LSC).

After receiving buy-in from virtually all female athletes, plus much of the university community, TSU announced in January 2019 that women's teams would once again be known as "Texans" starting in 2019–20.