CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The Carolina Panthers just added an offensive weapon with a pretty great résumé.

The team will be signing former Pro Bowl tight end Darren Waller to a one-year deal, a league source confirmed to The Charlotte Observer on Wednesday.

Waller, 33, was among the most notable free agents this offseason, but he went unsigned through the opening weeks of training camp. The 6-foot-6, 238-pound receiving threat is fresh off a season with the Miami Dolphins in which he played nine games and caught 24 passes for 283 yards and a tied-for-team-best six touchdowns.

He now joins the Panthers roster ahead of the team’s second preseason game against the Buffalo Bills on the road. The Saturday afternoon contest at Highmark Stadium will mark the first one of the preseason in which Panthers starters will play.

The news was first reported by Adam Schefter of ESPN.

Waller’s career started with the Baltimore Ravens, the team that selected him in the sixth round of the 2015 NFL draft. He played two seasons there before moving to the Raiders and becoming one of the best players at his position for two years. He notched 1,000-plus-receiving-yard seasons in 2019 and 2020, the latter of which he earned his Pro Bowl nod.

He stayed with the Raiders two years afterward and then was traded to the New York Giants ahead of 2023. After a largely disappointing season there — and then a “very scary” medical situation in November of that season that resulted in a three-day stay in a hospital — he retired.

He spent 2024 away from football entirely, in fact, chasing various other enterprises, including music, before joining the NFL again in 2025 with the Dolphins.

The Panthers — and quarterback Bryce Young — have acquired quite the potential weapon in Waller. And head coach Dave Canales and the rest of his staff saw Waller’s brilliance flash in Bank of America Stadium last season, Week 5, when the tight end recorded five catches for 78 yards and a touchdown that nearly held off a 27-24, march-from-behind Panthers win.

Waller also has experience with offensive assistant Darrell Bevell, who spent 2025 with the Dolphins. While Bevell didn’t see Waller at his peak, the coach still saw the playmaker flash some remarkable talent and be able to access the top of his game. Among Waller’s advanced stats that stand out from 2025, courtesy of Pro Football Focus: He had a 62.5% “contested catch rate” and enabled a career-high 135.2 passer rating when targeted.

The former Georgia Tech Yellow Jacket joins a tight end room that includes 2021 draft pick Tommy Tremble, 2024 draft pick Ja’Tavion Sanders and 2025 draft pick Mitchell Evans, as well as veteran James Mitchell and special teams ace Feleipe Franks. Canales and offensive coordinator Brad Idzik employ packages that include several tight ends on the field at the same time — but even still, that room is crowded, and several difficult decisions await this team come final cut day in September.

After this year’s NFL draft in April, general manager Dan Morgan told reporters that he liked the tight ends the team had on its roster.

“We have a lot of confidence in the guys that are on our roster, and I said that before,” Morgan said. He added, “If we feel like we need to figure out tight end and bring a different skill set in, then we’ll do that. But right now we feel good about it.”

The team hasn’t yet announced who will be waived or released to make room for Waller on its 91-man training camp roster.

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