Where to watch rugby union in Australia

Okay, let’s officially admit it: there are too many varieties of football you can watch in Australia. There’s soccer, the actual football. Then there’s the abbreviations: NRL, AFL and even NFL if you fancy American football. If you’re not all footballed out, there’s one other kind of football to watch during the colder months. Rugby union.

Scroll on for a ruck-load of live rugby union options, including throw-ins from some of the best sports streaming services in Australia.

If you want to watch a wide selection of rugby union content in Australia, then you want a subscription to Stan Sport. Like Foxtel Now, you’ll need a base Stan subscription, which costs either $12, $17 or $22 a month. The more you pay, the higher the Stan streaming fidelity and the more simultaneous streams you get: one, three or up to four streams. You also need to pay a $15 monthly fee to access Stan Sport, which grants access to the following rugby union content:

• Super Rugby Pacific
• Premiership Rugby
• The Rugby Championship
• Rugby World Cup France 2023
• Bledisloe Cup
• Six Nations (men’s and women’s)
• Super W
• Currie Cup
• Shute Shield
• Hospital Cup
• Rugby WA
• Autumn Nations Series
• Rugby Championships (U16s and U19s)
• Women’s Rugby
• World Rugby
• British & Irish Lions
• NZ Rugby NPC
• Tri Nations Rugby
• NZ Rugby FPC
• Super Rugby Aupiki
• U20 Championship

That may read like a lot of rugby union, and it is, but clicking on the categories suggests that some of those items lower down the list are relegated to on-demand replays of older series and matches. For those fanging for free rugby, it’s limited to one Super Rugby game per round on 9Now. You can also check out Wallabies home games, plus those played against New Zealand on 9Now, as well as four select Shute Shield and Hospital Cup round games, plus one game of each of the respective state finals.

For the Rugby World Cup, you’ll want a Stan Sport subscription to watch every game. Alternatively, all Wallabies games and the Rugby World Cup final will be streaming on 9Now. There is another free way to watch the Rugby World Cup, though, if you use a virtual private network (VPN).

Connect to a VPN server in the UK and sign up for a free ITVX account. You may need to get creative with finding a valid UK postal address to get access. Once you’re signed up, you’ll be able to stream all of the 2023 Rugby World Cup on ITVX. Try one of the VPNs below for fast streaming to UK servers:

• Windscribe VPN
• ExpressVPN
• NordVPN
• Atlas VPN
• IPVanish VPN
• PrivadoVPN
• Hola VPN
• CyberGhost VPN

Bledisloe Cup matches—the old rivalry between the Australian Wallabies and the New Zealand All Blacks—are available for streaming on Stan Sport. Alternatively, create a free 9Now account to stream Bledisloe Cup matches for free.

If you’re only interested in watching one Super Rugby game a week, you can sign up for a 9Now account and stream it for free. Otherwise, Stan Sport is the place to watch every Super Rugby match.

Foxtel may not be the home of rugby union anymore but it still has some content. Case in point, the Rugby Sevens. Admittedly, Kayo Sports and Foxtel Now are offering that via BeIN sports, and that agreement concludes at the end of June 2023. Assuming BeIN holds onto the Rugby Sevens rights in the future, you can pay either $19.99 a month or $179.99 a year to access rugby union and other sports.

As you may have noted in the list above, Six Nations matches are available for streaming on Stan Sport. 

Interested to see how the streaming services above stack up against the competition? Take a look at the table below for a comparison of your streaming options in Australia.