South Carolina NIL Rules

At a glance

NIL in South Carolina today.

College NIL: Legal (state law). High-school NIL: Not allowed, per S.C. Code §59-158 (S.685 2022, amended by H.4957 2024 & H.4902 2026) · SCHSL bylaws bar HS NIL per FY2025-27 budget proviso. NIL collectives: operating. Deal-disclosure threshold: Any deal. Governing statute: South Carolina intercollegiate athlete NIL law (S.685 / Act 35 of 2021, amended by H.4957 2024 and H.4902 2026) (S.C. Code Ann. § 59-158-10 et seq.), amended, effective July 2022. High-school governance: South Carolina High School League (SCHSL). Last reviewed August 2026 — this is a plain-English overview pending verification, not legal advice.

What to know

How the rules play out in South Carolina.

South Carolina's original NIL law (S.685, 2022, codified at S.C. Code §59-158) was substantially expanded by H.4957 (2024), letting schools identify, solicit, and facilitate NIL deals for their athletes and aligning state law with the House settlement's revenue-sharing/NIL Go clearinghouse regime. In 2026 the legislature passed H.4902 over the Governor's veto, exempting individual athletes' NIL and revenue-sharing contract amounts from the state's public-records law — schools now disclose only aggregate annual revenue-sharing totals, though athletes still must disclose deal terms to their own institution. High-school NIL flipped to prohibited: a state budget proviso bars districts from belonging to any athletic association that permits NIL pay, so the SCHSL reworded its bylaws in June 2025 to bar compensation for high-school athletes, with an escalating penalty structure for violations — confirm current SCHSL wording directly given how recently this changed.

Who governs NIL in South Carolina

South Carolina's college NIL law began as S.685, ratified May 4, 2021 and approved May 6, 2021 as Act 35, creating Title 59, Chapter 158; by its terms it took effect for each institution no later than July 1, 2022. It was substantially rewritten by H.4957 (Act 207), signed and effective May 21, 2024, and supplemented by H.4902 (Act 119) in 2026. High-school athletics are governed by the SCHSL, whose bylaws - amended in June 2025 to comply with a state budget proviso - now prohibit student-athletes from earning NIL compensation. That makes South Carolina one of the states where high-school NIL is not allowed as of August 2026.

What the college statute actually says

Chapter 158's key provisions per the official code text as of August 2026:

• § 59-158-20: institutions may identify, create, solicit, facilitate, and otherwise enable NIL opportunities for athletes and may permit use of institutional trademarks and facilities - a 2024 change from the original hands-off approach.
• § 59-158-20: compensation must be independent of, rather than payment for, athletic participation or performance, and no appropriated institutional funds may be used to pay athletes for NIL.
• § 59-158-20: no NIL compensation for endorsing tobacco, alcohol, illegal substances or activities, banned athletic substances, or gambling including sports betting.
• § 59-158-30: NIL contracts cannot extend beyond the athlete's eligibility period.
• § 59-158-50: NIL contract documentation held by institutions is not a public record; H.4902 (2026) extended similar confidentiality to individual revenue-sharing contracts while requiring disclosure of each institution's total annual revenue-sharing spend.
• § 59-158-60 and H.4957: athlete agents must comply with the state athlete-agent chapter and the federal Sports Agent Responsibility and Trust Act, with agent fees reported capped at twenty percent of the NIL contract.

High-school rules

The SCHSL's 2025-26 bylaws, Article III, Section 14 (Amateur Status), now state that a student may not earn compensation from the use of their name, image, and likeness, listing among the conditions that compensation not be contingent on athletic performance, not be an enrollment incentive, not come from the school or its agent, and that no school or SCHSL marks, apparel, or facilities be used. Sanctions escalate from a formal warning and forfeiture of money received (first violation) to one year of ineligibility (second violation). This was a 2025 reversal: from 2022 the League had allowed limited school-free NIL, but a budget proviso barring public school districts from affiliating with any association that permits NIL compensation forced the League to amend its bylaws in June 2025, per reporting.

The practical read

A South Carolina college athlete can earn NIL money with active help from their school, sign revenue-sharing deals under the House settlement, and keep contract details out of public records - but deals must not pay for athletic performance, touch the prohibited categories, or outlast eligibility, and deals of 600 dollars or more clear the NIL Go clearinghouse. A South Carolina high schooler currently cannot take NIL compensation without risking eligibility under SCHSL Article III, Section 14; even school-free endorsements are covered by the amended amateur rule. Families weighing deals for recruits should time signings around college enrollment and expect this area to be litigated.

What's moving

H.4902 became law in 2026 the hard way: Governor McMaster vetoed it on March 11, 2026, and the House (88-22, March 25) and Senate (30-12, April 1) overrode, making it Act 119, effective April 23, 2026. It shields individual NIL and revenue-sharing contracts from FOIA while requiring annual disclosure of total revenue-sharing spending. On the high-school side, legal commentators have questioned whether the budget-proviso ban can survive constitutional challenge, and reporting suggests challenges are likely - the prohibition could change quickly.

Go deeper

Compare states, then run your numbers.

Compare South Carolina with every other state in the NIL Rules by State tracker, estimate your take-home on NIL income with the free NIL Tax Calculator, and see what your name, image, and likeness is actually worth with HDBND's free athlete tools.