Across the Pond: Supercars, Rugby & Football media deals in NZ

Sky locks in Supercars for another four years

New Zealand’s Supercars fans can gear up for four more years of high-octane action, with Sky securing the rights to broadcast and stream the Supercars Championship from the start of 2026 through to the end of the 2029 season.

The four-year deal extends Sky’s longstanding partnership with Supercars, ensuring Kiwi fans can continue to follow their favourite drivers across the championship.

Sky to deliver every big rugby moment through to 2030 in new partnership with NZ Rugby and its SANZAAR partners

Sky and New Zealand Rugby (on behalf of SANZAAR Unions) are pleased to announce a renewed five-year broadcast partnership, commencing January 2026.

The agreement cements Sky as the home of rugby in Aotearoa New Zealand, delivering fans an unmatched line-up of world-class competitions and iconic tours, including new competitions and formats. Sky customers will enjoy exclusive¹ live access to:

International competitions

Every All Blacks match played in the SANZAAR countries, including:

The Bledisloe Cup and The Rugby Championship

New tours between the Springboks and All Blacks

The exciting new biennial men’s tournament featuring 12 teams across two conferences from the Six Nations and Southern Hemisphere Unions, culminating with a grand final series (the new ‘Nations Cup’ tournament, when finalised).

The 2029 British & Irish Lions tour to New Zealand.

More Black Ferns matches than ever before, including all matches from:

The Pacific Four Series

New September/October internationals

The British & Irish Lions Women’s tour in 2027

Māori All Blacks, All Blacks XV and Black Ferns matches played in the SANZAAR countries.

Club and domestic competitions

Every match from Super Rugby Pacific, Super Rugby Aupiki and Super W (and any new competition featuring Super Rugby teams).

Sky customers will also enjoy access to every match from the National Provincial Championship (NPC), selected matches from the Farah Palmer Cup and the finals of the Heartland Championship.

Sophie Moloney, Sky’s Chief Executive, commented: “We are delighted to have renewed our longstanding partnership with New Zealand Rugby and SANZAAR and to strengthen our partnerships with the Six Nations and the British & Irish Lions, securing an incredible array of rugby for our customers, bringing them well-loved and established competitions and tours, and a number of exciting new formats.”

“While the terms of the deal are commercially sensitive, we’re confident that we’ve reached a position that is sustainable for Sky over the five-year term and which also supports the long-term health of Rugby in New Zealand. We’ve worked closely with New Zealand Rugby to build an agreement that seeks to grow audiences, deepen fandom, and thrill our customers with the delivery of five years of high-quality rugby, on and off the pitch.”

To support the visibility and growth of domestic rugby, Sky and New Zealand Rugby will sublicense a selection of domestic matches to be broadcast free-to-air by TVNZ. This will include all NPC matches and a selection of Heartland and Farah Palmer Cup matches. Sublicensed matches will continue to be available to Sky customers as part of their Sky Sport package.

New Zealand Rugby has reserved the right to play up to five offshore All Blacks and Black Ferns matches respectively over the five-year term from outside the scheduled competitions, to support its efforts to increase its revenue base. New Zealand rights to broadcast such matches will be negotiated on a match-by-match basis at the time.

This agreement complements Sky’s suite of world class rugby rights, which already includes long-term agreements for international and offshore competitions:

Men’s and Women’s Rugby World Cups

Rugby World Cup Sevens

HSBC World Sevens Series

World Rugby U20 Championships

Six Nations

UK Gallagher Premiership.

TVNZ will become NZR’s free-to-air provincial rugby partner, which includes all NPC matches and select Farah Palmer Cup and Heartland Championship games.

The agreement with TVNZ will see 93 provincial matches available free-to-view on TVNZ+, with three games a week in appointment viewing slots on TVNZ 1. These matches will also be shown co-exclusively live on Sky.

Football

TVNZ has secured exclusive rights to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, with free-to-air and paid options on TVNZ1 and TVNZ+ from June next year.

All New Zealand matches, alongside a selection of other games will be available free-to-air on TVNZ1. The 1News team will also be on the ground bringing Kiwis access to the stories and players at the World Cup.

For fans wanting to catch every moment of the action, a one-off event pass on TVNZ+ will be available for purchase. The pass will offer fans the flexibility to enjoy every match, live and uninterrupted, wherever and whenever they choose.

Following the announcement that TVNZ will be the home of the FIFA World Cup 26™, TVNZ have partnered with New Zealand Football to bring All Whites games leading up to the tournament to free-to-air, both on broadcast and TVNZ+, in addition to being available on FIFA+.

The partnership will start with September’s home and away series for the Soccer Ashes against Australia’s Socceroos, at Canberra’s GIO Stadium on Friday 5 September (KO 9:45pm NZT), and Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s Go Media Stadium on Tuesday 9 September (KO 7pm NZT).

Both games will be broadcast on TVNZ’s DUKE channel and TVNZ+.

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