The 1998 AFL season was the 102nd season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured sixteen clubs, ran from 27 March until 26 September, and comprised a 22-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top eight clubs.

The premiership was won by the Adelaide Football Club for the second time and second time consecutively, after it defeated North Melbourne by 35 points in the 1998 AFL Grand Final.

See 1998 AFL Draft.

North Melbourne defeated St Kilda 14.13 (97) to 12.11 (83) in the final.

Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for
Average score: 93.6
Source: AFL Tables

• The Brownlow Medal was awarded to Robert Harvey of St Kilda
• The Leigh Matthews Trophy was awarded to Wayne Carey of North Melbourne
• The Coleman Medal was awarded to Tony Lockett of Sydney
• The Norm Smith Medal was awarded to Andrew McLeod of Adelaide
• The AFL Rising Star award was awarded to Byron Pickett of North Melbourne
• The Wooden Spoon was "awarded" to Brisbane Lions

• Adelaide became the first club since the introduction of the final five in 1972 to win the premiership from outside the top four, despite losing their first final heavily against Melbourne.
• Sydney's 101-point loss to St Kilda in round 10 is the most recent occasion as of 2023 that the club has lost a premiership match by 100 points or more.^[1] Of the 18 active clubs in the AFL, the Swans have currently gone the longest without a triple-figure margin loss.^[2]