Women’s international rugby competition will begin later this month

WXV world rugby women's rugby

ITV and S4C will air the WXV, a new women’s international rugby competition, when it kicks off later this month. 

A three-division annual competition, the first edition of WXV will take place over three weekends from 14 October until 4 November. It aims to give a clear pathway to the Women’s Rugby World Cup, ahead of an expanded 16-team event in 2025.

ITV will show all three England and Wales games on ITVX, with S4C to show only the Wales fixtures. International broadcasters include SuperSport showing the second division in South Africa, Sky NZ in New Zealand, and BEIN in South-East Asia. All territories without a broadcaster will be able to watch the competition on Rugby Pass TV, an OTT platform that World Rugby launched ahead of the men’s World Cup that’s currently taking place.

The top division of WXV includes England, Wales, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and France, while division two has Scotland, Italy, South Africa, Japan, USA, and Samoa. The third division comprises of Ireland, Fiji, Colombia, Kazakhstan, Spain, and Kenya.

World Rugby chief of women’s rugby Sally Horrox said: “Visibility for the women’s game is key and fans around the world will now have more opportunities than ever to get closer to the game with our world-class streaming platform, RugbyPass TV showing all the WXV fixtures for free. This is an exciting step forward for the women’s game and it will undoubtably play a leading role in awareness, promotion and accessibility of this fantastic new tournament.”

World Rugby chief commercial officer Ben Slack added: “Growing the reach and visibility of women’s rugby is central to our overall growth mission and we are delighted to be welcoming a strong line-up of broadcasters with proven rugby pedigree for WXV. The blend of free-to-air broadcast along with provision of free programming and content via RugbyPass TV for markets where a broadcast partner does exit, means that no matter where you are in the world you can watch all the action from WXV.”