The National Football League playoffs for the 1997 season began on December 27, 1997. The postseason tournament concluded with the Denver Broncos defeating the Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl XXXII, 31–24, on January 25, 1998, at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, California.

For the first time ever, all three Florida teams (the Jacksonville Jaguars, Miami Dolphins, and Tampa Bay Buccaneers) qualified for the playoffs. The feat would repeat itself in the 1999 postseason and again during the 2022 postseason.

Within each conference, the three division winners and the three non-division winners with the best overall regular season records qualified for the playoffs. The three division winners were seeded 1–3 based on the overall won-lost-tied record, and the three wild card teams were seeded 4–6. The NFL did not use a fixed bracket playoff system, and there were no restrictions regarding teams from the same division matching up in any round. In the first round, dubbed the wild-card playoffs or wild-card weekend, the third-seeded division winner hosted the sixth seed wild card, and the fourth seed hosted the fifth. The 1 and 2 seeds from each conference received a first-round bye. In the second round, the divisional playoffs, the number 1 seed hosted the worst-remaining seed from the first round (seed 4, 5, or 6), while the number 2 seed played the other team (seed 3, 4, or 5). The two winning teams from each conference's divisional playoff games then meet in the respective AFC and NFC Conference Championship games, hosted by the higher seed. Although the Super Bowl, the championship round of the playoffs, was played at a neutral site, the designated home team was based on an annual rotation by conference.

These playoffs marked the final season that NBC was the AFC network. CBS would then take over the rights to the AFC before the start of the following season. Super Bowl XXXII was also NBC's last NFL broadcast overall until 2006, when they signed on to televise Sunday Night Football.

ABC continued to broadcast the first two Wild Card playoff games, and Fox televised the rest of the NFC games.

at Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, New Jersey

The 1997 playoffs were notable for featuring four teams from the NFC Central. At fourth place were the Vikings, who had started the year a promising 8–2 before losing five straight games and barely making the postseason with a 9–7 record. The Vikings had made the playoffs in four of the last five seasons, but had lost each time in the first round. This time, however, they managed to earn a win by scoring 10 points in the final 90 seconds of the game.

Vikings quarterback Randall Cunningham got off to a rough start as he lost three first half turnovers that would be converted into nine New York points. After each team punted to start the game, Cunningham lost a fumble that was recovered by defensive tackle Bernard Holsey on the Vikings 23. New York ended up losing yardage with their ensuing drive, but Brad Daluiso kicked a 43-yard field goal to put them up 3–0. Cunningham fumbled again on his next drive, and New York defensive end Michael Strahan recovered the ball on the Minnesota 46-yard line. Quarterback Danny Kanell subsequently completed a 27-yard pass to fullback Charles Way, setting up Daluiso's second field goal that made the score 6–0.